We are making decent progress for having had to stay in the same room for the last couple of days. By the time I managed to stabilise my foundation,cvery single little sound had begun to startle us.

  Any more time in that room and we would have begun to attack each other at the sound of our breathing. Things had gone that bad. I still don't know why we were not attacked already.

  The instant that I recovered from overusing my formation base we began our exploration of the place. Speaking about our exploration, we are making actually good time. We have visited almost six different room. A kitchen, three dorms and two storage rooms.

  Well, we had the good luck of ending up in one of the less important places in the inner keep. It is some kind of a servant quarters. That means that the quality of the traps and alarms here are much inferior to the ones that we could find in the inner keep proper. They also had to seriously keep the alarms in the area less sensitive than they are usually kept. Otherwise, we would not be able to make such quick progress. Even the traps are less complex than they would usually be.

  Not that I have needed to worry about traps though. I have not yet needed to dismantle even a single trap in this entire time. Alarms yes, but not traps.

  That is actually pretty weird if I am to be honest. Trevor thinks this is because the vampires must have set off all the traps. After they would have needed a point of entry and this is about as good as a place to infiltrate the place.

  I just can't see how they could have done it though. Any traps set off should have set off the alarms as well. All alarms are designed in such a way that they will react when they sense a certain amount of mana flowing in the region. I can expect a martial mage to be able to control their vital mana to such a degree that they will not set of such a trap, but precise mana control is not what pops into your head when you think of vampires.

  If anything, they are the race that least need to worry about not having enough mana. Well, if I am honest vampires are creatures that always have a bag of tricks. Just their grunts can get so hard to fight. I will figure out this trick of theirs soon enough. I am personally betting on some kind of a infernal summoning. A imp would be capable of pulling this off.

  Well, I don't bother thinking too much on it. After all we are in enemy territory right now. I had expected to be attacked on our first day here. Somehow our luck has held till now. Yet I can't stop the creeping suspicion that something is following us. It is like a ghost at the edge of my vision.

  Well, vampires are capable of that kind of stealth. I just don't think they would be this willing to be stealthy when they already control the place. I am sure that we would have been attacked by now if the vampire were after us.

  Fuck, I really should be focussing right now. After all I have to open this alarm without setting it off. Alarm spells are pesky little formations to deal with.

  They are build in such a way that even the lightest contact with external mana will set the entire thing off, warning everybody to your presence. To dismantle it you basically need to separate the sensitive part from the non sensitive and you have to do so gently. Otherwise you risk setting of the alarm yourself revealing to everybody you are here.

  Then the vampires will attack us, regardless of if they are following us or not. Right now that is something that we cannot afford. To be honest we don't know who controls the defense formation of this part of the fort. It could the mayfires or it could be the vampires.

  If it is the mayfires, we don't need to worry about being revealed because ultimately that is our goal. If we manage to meet up with them then I can finally calm down a bit. It is the vampires that we don't want discovering us.

  The alarm formation that I am dealing with is one of the most sensitive formations that I have dealt with in all of this time. This makes me think that this door leads into one of the more important areas of the inner keep.

  That means that we have more chances of encountering the bloodfire gang or the mayfires. Thus, it would be wiser to be very cautious.

  (After about ten minutes.)

  Well, there it goes.

  The minute that the spell gives away I retreat at the same instant. I literally jump backward keeping my sword ready. After all, if anybody is there in the other room the instant after the alarm spell is shattered is the best time to ambush a person.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  The chance of that happening is actually pretty low, considering the fact that I would have detected them if that was the case. Still, the one thing that I have learnt in my life is to be as careful as possible. you can never tell what vampires can be capable of.

  I signal to the other people in my room to enter into stance. Trevor takes position to my right and Andrew takes position to my left. Jacob is just behind me.

  Jacob is the fastest of us, wielding twin daggers. If an enemy were to be present in the next room, his duty is to convey that information. Based on the enemy strength jacob will have to convey which strategy we will be following.

  Andrew, who is using a sword and shield and trevor, who is using a sword are the reserve. They will either follow me, stay put or retreat based on the enemies action. Finally, I am the vanguard. I will be the first to enter into the place, and based on the enemy strength give commands through Jacob.

  With everybody taking position it is time for me to open the door. All of this preparation seem to be a bit over, but you never know who could be on the other side.

  Finally, the door creaks open as I quickly case the room. It is some kind of an office. The room is bare except for a table and a bookshelf. More importantly there is no enemy here.

  I signal the soldiers to follow behind me.

  They quickly make their way into the room. Already, I can see trevor casing the room. The places in which potential enemies might be hiding. The possible places in which we can hide.

  Well, I am supposed to be doing the same thing. Well, the room is pretty easily defensible. We can make use of the table to blockade the door. It is a good solid table. Nothing will be able to break it easily.

  Similarly the bookshelf can be used but moving it would make way more noise. The books present in the bookshelf can be used to light a fire. Out of curiosity, I open the books to see what is on it.

  Well, it is some kind of an entry log for the servants, recording their time if entery and exit. I put the thing back quietly. I mean, it could be paranoia but I can't see beyond this room in my mana sense.

  "Well, Andrew would you close the door to the room behind us.", I whisper to Andrew, my voice echoing like drum beats.

  The room has two doors, the one that we just came through and the one that leads to the outside. The formations on this door are even stronger than the one that I have just broken through. Thankfully, There is no alarm formation.

  At a quick glance, there are three formations here. The first is the reason that my mana sense is not working. The other two are some kind of formation to monitor this room. They most likely record any noise in the room and record any mana signature in the room.

  Well, if they had a person monitoring the core formations for this we have been discovered already, though the chance of that actually happening is pretty low. The enemy is in a state of active combat. I have a sneaking suspicion that they don't have enough people to attack the mayfires, let alone monitor all the defensive formations.

  So right now I will focus on the first formation. Give me five minutes, I don't need to be as gentle with this formation as I need to be with a alarm formation. Still, I will try to be gentle. I can't really tell if there is a enemy in the other room after all.

  (After about five minutes.)

  Well, it was good that I destroyed the formation. Right now I can sense mana in the room beyond. I am not able to tell exactly how much mana or how many mages are using it but I can tell that it is being used. There are mages on the other side of the room.

  Well, we do not have the option to hide anymore. The destruction of the formation would have alerted the people there. With how much they are throwing mana around they will notice this. The only hope that I have is that the other side is not vampires. I cant tell if the mana on the other side is blood mana or not.

  Still, I keep my sword ready, not activating it though. I will do so on the basis of enemy we are facing. The troop has taken positon behind me already, the same as the previous time.

  I open the door ready to be ambushed. The scene beyond is about as shocking as one would expect it to be. Well, I was certainly not expecting to see a genocide like this. there are corpses strewn across the hall I find myself in.

  The corpses all are wearing different uniform, so it must be the bloodfire gang.

  "This is a surprise.", a voice speaks out from the other end of the hall.

  The hall is massive with four or five doors spread across it. I make a note on every door as I finally look at the man. To do this I need to step over a few of the bodies. They have all been burnt black. My troop follows behind me in formation.

  The man is hiding in some kind of a barrier. I rack my head trying to think if the man is an ally or not. Logically speaking it should be a mayfire but something feels really long. It is the mana that they are using for the barrier. It is not fire mana. It is also not blood mana. I have never seen such a type of mana. All I can do to describe it is that it is creepy.

  "Are you dumb, vampire.", the man speaks again, his voice more like a harsh whisper. The more he speaks the clearer it is that we are enemies.

  "I am wondering what kind of magic you are wielding. I have never seen magic like this", I reply, pretty much on an impulse.

  "You don't know do you, vampire.", the man speaks, his voice seriously creeping the fuck out of me. "Well, they did mention about you. The vampire that is killing all the vampires."

  I do not get to reply to this. Even as he speaks I feel the mana that he begins to emit. That is too much mana flowing in the room, flowing like a tidal wave of ice. Yet the thing that caused me to shiver from my bones is not this wave of mana. I can see the corpses get up in the corners of my eyes.