Dungeon of Pride, Laplace

Like a circle, these strange lines encircled him in the centre and pulsed with a blood red colour.

"W-what is happening? What are you trying to do to me"

Marcel tried to struggle as the sinister looking blood red lines slowly started inching towards him. From his feet, they travelled towards his body and before long, he looked like a person with blood red patterns all over his body.

These patterns pulsed with a bloody light and entered his body almost as if integrating with him.

"AAARRGHH!!" Almost at the same time, a blood curdling scream that was incomparable to the time when he was being interrogated came out of Marcel.

His scream contained so much pain and agony that anyone who heard it could almost feel his pain. Marcel continued to scream his heart out until his throat became sore, his screams started sounding more like a croak now.

The entire process didn't take much longer but to Marcel and anyone hearing his screams, it appeared as if hours had passed. When in reality, less than a quarter of an hour had passed.

After the blood red line disappeared, the ground returned to its former colour and Marcel who was bound to the pillar limped down.

"What did you do to him? He is not dead right?" Burg questioned, his throat made an inadvertent gulping sound as he remembered the inhumane screams of the man.

"Of course not, I just turned him into an obedient servant of mine, a low ranking vampire familiar" Theodore answered cheerfully.

It was also now that they realised that it was only their side that was affected. Annette and the others appeared unfazed throughout the whole ordeal.

"A vampire?! Does that mean that he is no longer human?"

"That is correct, he has turned into a race that is close to mine. Now he will never be able to betray us"

After explaining, Theodore walked towards Ariel and praised her "You did a good job… but did you really have to use the most torturous method of conversion?"

There were other methods of transforming someone into a low ranking vampire other than the blood pact which was the most brutal and painful one.

"Hehe, there is no way I am going to let the blood of a dirty human ruin my mouth. There is only one person's blood I swore to drink in this life" Ariel replied with a passionate and sultry look in her eyes as she gazed at him.

"I see... then here is your reward" Theodore pushed his sleeve and allowed Ariel to bite his hand.

"I am forever grateful my liege"

Saying so, she happily drank some of his blood with relish. The scene was quite unusual and strange for people like Cynthia and her group to witness. However, they knew better than to probe around and keep their mouths shut.

It didn't take long for Marcel to regain consciousness, the moment he did, he easily broke out of his restraints. The chains made of special material binding him snapped easily as if it was made of sand.

As he stretched his body, one could tell that something about him had fundamentally changed. Although, he still retained his previous appearance, his body and the aura that he naturally exuded had changed completely. He was taller, more muscular, and with features that one couldn't easily overlook.

To put it bluntly, his charms and handsomeness had increased manifold. However, this wasn't the only change Marcel had gone through, what struck others the most was his piercing crimson eyes which was a little similar to the two children and the elf.

"Master" he knelt on one knee.

"Hmm… it looks like it was a perfect integration. Good, from now on you are one of my, Theodore Bloodrite's familiar".

"Yes master"…

"Call him Ancestor" Ariel corrected.

.

.

"Is he the same person? He seems completely different from before. Princess can we really trust him?"

Later the same day, the group gathered near an alleyway not far away from the location Marcel was supposed to meet the high ranking member of the Chaos Order organisation.

"Hmph, are you doubting my abilities?" Ariel glared at Burg in an unfriendly manner.

"Please excuse him Miss Ariel, he is an idiot" Marba from the side grabbed Burg's head and forced him to apologise.

"Silence everyone, it's time" On Cynthia's rebuttal all of them shut their mouth and observed Marcel who was standing in front of an intersection that connected three roads.

Given that it was the time of the night and the place was a remote area that not many people visited, it made for a perfect place for criminals to hang around.

The group didn't have to wait before a tall man wearing a brown robe and Mythril armour underneath, walked towards Marcel and initiated a conversation.

"Who is that person?"…

"Wait why do I feel like his face is familiar? Could it be Dieter?"..

"You know him, Bert?"

At his words, every eyes turned towards the old assassin. Bert did not hide anything and nodded his head.

"When I was still an adventurer, I met him on one of my journeys. At that time, he was a young man who showed remarkable talent and was extremely skilled with daggers. I thought that he was someone destined for greatness, never could I have imagined that he would one day join a criminal organisation".

"So that was the case" Cynthia nodded her head. Before becoming one of her retainers, Bret was someone who was once a renowned adventurer who travelled to many countries. As such it did not come as surprise to her that he knew the man in the robe.

"However, that is not important right now. With his involvement, things have gotten even more complicated. Your Highness I must inform you that man belongs to the guild Blades of Ascension, a guild many times more powerful and bigger than even the most powerful guild of the kingdom, the Sea Gods Trident"

"With Dieter being one, they have many high levelled people who are above level 600. What's more, there could also be Rankers among them"

Rankers… just as those words came out of Bret's mouth, the atmosphere around Cynthia's group changed.

What kind of concept was a Ranker? Their monstrous talent and abilities aside, a ranker meant that they were above level 700 and had enough potential and strength to be ranked among the strongest in the Central Continent.

For a country like theirs, the realm of level 700 was like a legend that only their founder was able to reach ever since the founding of their kingdom. So it could be imagined how disheartening it was for them to know that among their enemies there might even be rankers.

"What are you guys panicking for, our side isn't any less powerful" Cynthia words woke the others up. That's right, what were they worried about? It was not like they were alone, they had the aid the demon sent them.

Although they did not know how powerful these people are, but from the fact that they were people closest to the demon, they ought to be very powerful.

The group silently watched Marcel as he discussed something with the brown robe person. After a while, the latter left and Marcel after taking a detour to make sure nobody followed him, came back to the group.

"So what were you discussing with that person?" Alvara immediately questioned as soon as he arrived.

However, Marcel did not reply immediately, he first looked at Ariel and only after seeing her nod, that he open his mouth and report.

"The Viper and the Chaos Order are about to make a move. They came to me because my achievements were enough to garner their attention. They asked for my aid in the upcoming battle against the Resistors. It appears that they have found one of the places where the criminal organisation was keeping the hostages to make the adventurers and guilds obedient to them".

Everybody took a moment to digest the information. This was a great clue that would lead them to the activity of the criminal organisation and what they were trying to accomplish.

"It's as I thought, there are people who are trying to fight against these organisations. If we can bring those people to our side, it would greatly boost our strength and help us when we take down the criminal organisations" Cynthia mused, she looked at Marcel and questioned.

"When and where is this raid going to be?" This was the perfect opportunity for them to grasp a weakness of the criminal organisations and Cynthia was not going to miss it.

"It's tomorrow at the outskirts of the town, near the borders of the southern region of the forest. There is a rock formation there, that person asked me to be ready there at the first sign of dawn break. It appears that they are going to ambush the resistors there"…

"I see, it's the perfect opportunity then. When the criminal organisations are engaging with the resistors, we are going to attack them. This way their ambush will fail and we will gain some new allies. Alvara I will leave it to you to lead our team"…

"Leave it to me, princess, I will not fail you"…

"Hoh, look at them go, they really are a high spirited bunch" Ariel commented, covering her mouth as she smiled.

"By the way master, what are my orders?"

"Hm? Ah, you are to stay on standby. Now that you have completely assimilated with the power inside you, this is the perfect stage for you and the others to try out your powers and get used to them" Theodore answered.