The manor must have been quite nice, once, especially considering it was in the middle of nowhere. Like everything else, the interior had a coating of black pollen, but it wasn't enough to hide the beautiful artistry.

A large split staircase took up most of the far wall, the wooden bannisters carved into various reliefs. He saw various monsters carved into the fine wood, some of which he recognised and some of which he did not. There were griffons, unicorns, and multi-headed hydras. One section even had a winged elephant surrounded by fish, also with feathered wings.

Several doors led off to the different rooms of the house, including those at the top of the stairwell, which had wrapped halfway around the room on their ponderous ascent to the second floor. It looked impressively made, but Symon had a bigger priority — the trail on the floor continued on through one of the slightly ajar ground-level doors.

He allowed the path to guide him, following it with his sword in hand and thread at the ready. To his surprise, none of the everpresent roses had infested the manor, so his threads had nothing to latch onto. Luckily for him, the usually inconvenient range and ability to go through physical objects worked in his favour, allowing him to scout things out with the hungry magic before entering the next room.

The thread snaked through the door, searching for anything to consume, but found nothing. The groundskeeper must have been meticulous in ensuring the roses didn't infest the mansion. Even the everpresent pollen was rapidly thinning into nothing.

This close to the heavy, ornately engraved — with roses, because of course — wooden door, Symon picked out more details in the tracks. The same line through the dust as before, leading under the door. It was still slightly ajar, but whoever or whatever came through here had made an effort to close the door behind them.

Hmm, that's a good sign. A monster wouldn't do that. Well, maybe a revenant butler would, but one would have shown up by now. After all, the groundskeeper burst out of his room as soon as I entered the garden.

There was something new, as well, the imprint of a hand so cleanly pressed against the door that it was impossible to miss, even in the low light. A splotch of dried, darkened blood was smeared in the centre, where the palm had been.

He held his own hand up to compare, finding it to be similarly sized. However, the proportions were subtly yet noticeably off; the fingers were narrow and just a little too long, while the palm was smaller than it should have been. It wasn't to a ridiculous extent. If he'd seen someone with hands like that back on Earth, he would think 'Wow, those are some long fingers' and then move on without a second thought.

But all alone in a dark, possibly zombie-infested manor, Symon tried to extract as much information from this single clue as possible. Judging by the size, the person the hand belonged to must have been an adult. It could have been a baby giant, he supposed, but he hadn't heard of them yet so he doubted they were common, or if they even existed at all. All the other people he'd met had similar proportions to him, including the Dumosans, the Imperials, and the natives of Brackstead. They were from the Empire, too, although one of the subjugated vassals that Lady Renske had ruled over before she came here.

That was to say that the owner of the hand was unlikely to be someone from the village who had gotten lost and somehow made their way through or otherwise circumvented the barrier surrounding the manor's grounds. That had already been low on his list of possible theories, but this shoved it down even further. The old mayor and his son would have mentioned if someone had recently gone missing.

No, this can't be someone from the village. One of the Baron's men, maybe? The timing lines up, but I doubt just one person would be sent, and I'm only seeing signs of a single injured person.

There was no other civilisation on this continent other than Brackstead of a similar size, at least as far as he knew. It was entirely possible that foreign adventurers had shown up, though, much like the Dumosans had, or that someone had set up a small camp nearby for illegal logging or some equally mundane reason.

Well, time to stop delaying. You're the one who wanted to try and rescue whoever it is.

Tentatively, he pressed onwards, slowly pushing the door open. He expected it to creak on rusted hinges, but it slid open smoothly and silently. A long, nearly pitch-black hallway stretched on ahead of him. It had rooms on either side for as far as he could see — which admittedly wasn't far — as none of the exterior windows reached this hallway.

The already scant light from the large foyer room did little to allow him to see down the hallway, but it was enough to make out a carpeted rug in surprisingly decent condition. It didn't have any pollen on it or even any regular dust for that matter, showing off a beautiful ruby red colour with gold trim.

His thread reached further than he could see, which wouldn't do. He gently nudged the door back, then took his small pack off before gently placing it to the side of the door, still in the main room. It had a small torch strapped to the side, which he took off and lit using a firestarter. It was a classic flint and steel style 'bang two pieces together and sparks come out' type of deal, which let out a sharp sound as his torch lit up with a gentle thwump. The torch itself was surprisingly high quality, being purchased by Aslan in a big city off in the Eastern continent. Apparently, the tip was soaked in some kind of alchemical oil designed to burn slowly and steadily.

The noise of the striker made him wince, but the fight outside hadn't exactly been stealthy. One of the sheds had collapsed, after all. Now able to see, Symon pushed open the doorway again and stepped into the hallway.

The rug looked even nicer now that he could properly see it, but the torchlight also made it clear that the trail in the now-thin dusting of pollen did not continue onto the suspiciously clean rug. He reached out hesitantly to poke it with the toe of his boot, but changed his mind and used his sword instead. The rug didn't react.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Okay, not a mimic. Better safe than sorry.

More confidently, Symon stepped onto it. The dirty footprints he left quickly vanished, explaining why it was in such pristine quality. It must have been an enchanted rug, of all things. It also explained why the trail of blood splatters had stopped, so he instead followed along the magical carpet.

It was impossible to tell how far the hallway stretched, but presuming it went the length of the manor, he wasn't even halfway. Really, he didn't know why a manor would need so many rooms, having passed at least a dozen. Looking behind him, he could see the dim silhouette of the doorway, while ahead of him was nothing but darkness, the flames of his little torch feebly pressing it back.

Despite the general eerieness, nothing happened as he continued down the hall, his muted steps echoing around him. Eventually, he found the end of the rug. The trail in the dust alongside the dried blood continued, but the source was already in view.

"Christ..." he whispered to himself as he looked at the figure slumped against the wall, their features difficult to make out in the darkness. What was clear, however, was the massive pool of dark, caked-in blood in a circle on the floor around them.

As he'd guessed by the age of the blood, the body must have been fairly recently deceased. Their top half was obscured, collapsed behind a small plinth with a simple carving atop it, but the reason for all the blood was clear. It looked like an arrow, or even a crossbow bolt, but much thicker and without any fletching. It was also embedded deep into their lower back, the bolt caked in dried blood. To top it all off, the figure had heavy manacles around their ankles, with only the barest slack in the chain between them. They were extremely skinny, and a pale grey colour that he associated with extreme blood loss.

Whoever this unfortunate figure was, they'd been chained and grievously injured, but had somehow made it all the way to the mansion before finally giving in to their injuries. He had to respect the tenacity needed for that; it wasn't like they would have had Pain Resistance to make it easier for them, just sheer grit.

He was glad he hadn't found some dangerous monster, but he still needed to figure out who they were. If they ended up being from the village, he wanted to return them for a proper burial.

I've gotta be careful; whatever killed them could still be around, he thought to himself as he stepped closer for a better look. As he approached, some of the details clarified. The legs sticking out from behind the plinth weren't just skinny; they were the skeletal thinness of someone who had been severely starved. The grey flesh was barely clothed in ragged, bloodstained rags.

Out of nowhere, his thread lashed out and attached to the body. A trickle of vitality began flowing down the thread towards his vessel.

Symon yelped and launched himself backward like a shocked cat, the connection cutting off almost as soon as it started. His reaction might have been funny in different circumstances. "Holy shit, hello? Can you hear me?" Symon asked in Common.

Even though it had only been a fraction of a second, he could tell that the vitality he'd accidentally stolen was weak but pure. He felt no trace of the undead taint as the essence merged with the useable stuff that floated freely around in his vessel, avoiding the taint at the bottom that was still slowly dissolving.

The figure didn't respond or even stir, but he hadn't been anticipating anything. It was already a miracle that they were somehow still alive.

Shit, shit, think! What the hell can I do?

Somehow, this person was still alive, but they were hanging on by the barest of slivers. He'd felt how weak their vitality was, and feared that even just a few seconds of draining would be enough to push them over the edge and into death's embrace. In most situations, he would have risked it. He was amazed they'd lived so long that their blood had dried so completely — surely the influence of an improved Constitution and possibly some other skills — but had no idea how much longer they had. A normal person from Earth would have been dead already, and there was nothing nearby that he could drain, even just for the few seconds he'd need to get close.

He could run up, force all his vitality in as fast as he could, and then get out of range equally quickly. It had worked well with the old mayor Temuri, the given vitality outweighing that which had been stolen, but he doubted that would work here. Their situation was so precarious that there was no way he could move fast enough, not when he'd need to rip out whatever was embedded in their back first.

He felt the beginning of panic creeping in, but clamped down on it with all his Willpower. He couldn't afford to get sloppy. Ideas began flashing through his mind, being discarded almost as quickly as they appeared.

Could he pull in a whole bunch of still living roses from outside and use them to allow him to get close? No, there's no way I could collect an amount large enough to survive the trip any time soon.

Perhaps he could guide one of his friends through the tornado of black mist, using his healing to keep them alive and then use them as a safety net to get close? Maybe, but that pollen is really damn dangerous to those without a resistance. It's poor odds I can heal them fast enough to make it all the way through, and training the resistance for them would take too long.

None of these possible solutions were the correct combination of fast enough and safe enough. He couldn't simply use his Willpower to silence the thread's hunger, either. Direct and guide it, sure, but not control it completely.

He couldn't rely on others, and he couldn't rely on himself, either. Keelgrave was still suppressed, not that he'd be able to do anything.

There was one gamble he could try. His only chance — the dying person's only chance — for survival. Both of his Class skills were at level 19, the cusp of evolution to the First Step. If he could manage it...

Before Symon could second guess himself, he turned around and began sprinting back outside. If he could get some type of control over Seize with its evolution, or even something like more range on Idealise, allowing him to heal from outside the range of draining, it just might work.

His boots slammed into the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust and pollen behind him as he left the hallway and charged right through the front door, sending it slamming open and taking him outside. Without needing to be told, the thread licked out and attached to a rose the moment he got in range.

All at once, he empowered the draining, sheathed his sword, and summoned his Ledger. His thoughts were so focused he didn't even have to specify as his abilities wrote themselves into the dust and sweat-streaked mess on his palm.

[ Idealise (19) Seize (19) ]

Fuck, which one is closest to 20? He bit his lip, trying to determine which one he should focus on. No, no, I can't risk the evolution not having a good option. I need to do both.

Seize was of course already working, but the pace wasn't as fast as it could be. His vessel was full, so it was sluggish as it attempted to cram more vitality into it. Idealise wasn't doing anything at all, as it had no injuries to fix.

There was a convenient way to fix both problems.

His already white-knuckled grip on his torch tightened even further as he gritted his teeth. Without any further hesitation, he held the torch to his chest and pressed the burning flame to his bare flesh.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.