The Blood Princess Master Who Faked Her Death Wants to Avoid the Saintess Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Waste Is Shaful

"Hey, big guy." Veiloria flicked her wrist, her gaze sweeping the surroundings. She casually picked up a relatively straight dry branch from beside the wall and weighed it in her hand.

Her tone was mocking: "Your target is her? Not bad taste—but... did you ask for my opinion before trying to touch my 'guest'?"

The werewolf seed to only now notice this inconvenient "human female." He let out a low growl and turned his murderous gaze toward Veiloria: "Ant, get lost! Or I'll rip you apart too!"

"Oh? Quite the big talk." Veiloria twirled a sword flourish with the branch, her movents fluid and elegant—a striking contrast to her current fragile appearance as "Lia."

She couldn't use any spell, not even the slightest Arcane Energy fluctuation—any such disturbance could be sensed by Ximilita, who was right beside her.

But that was fine. Her skills as the Wandering Sword Saint weren't built on magic alone.

"With those half-baked moves of yours, you think you can tell to get lost?"

The blatant provocation instantly ignited the werewolf's rage. "Rooarrr——!!"

He dropped the talk and charged on all fours like a true beast, faster than before, claws lunging straight for Veiloria's throat!

Yet Veiloria rely shifted slightly to the side, and that fierce strike skimd past the hem of her clothes.

The werewolf's attack missed, and his massive body's montum carried him forward before he could turn. By then, the branch in Veiloria's hand had already snapped out like a viper, tapping a spot along his ribs.

It didn't hurt—but the feeling of being toyed with so contemptuously only drove the werewolf into a greater fury.

He snarled and spun around, swiping his claws in a wide arc that whipped up a howling gust of wind.

Veiloria's toes brushed the ground as her body drifted backward, effortlessly dodging that lethal strike once again.

The branch seed to co alive in her hand—every ti she evaded, she'd land a light, stinging flick sowhere on the werewolf. The taunting drove him into an even wilder rage.

"Too slow."

"You've got strength, I'll give you that—sha you can't land a hit, hm~"

"Is that all you've got? Did your tribe's combat arts go extinct? How pitiful."

Veiloria kept evading while needling him in that deliberately infuriating tone—every bit the insufferable little gremlin who could provoke soone to death and feel no remorse. She even had the audacity to brush her disheveled bangs back into place mid-fight.

"RAAHHH!! I'LL RIP YOU TO SHREDS!!" The werewolf lost all reason. His eyes turned bloodshot crimson; he abandoned any pretense of defense and threw himself into the most savage assault he could manage, determined to tear this maddening woman apart!

The muscles across his body swelled further, his fur standing on end—he had clearly entered so kind of berserk state. Speed and strength surged again as he hurled himself at her, clawing and snapping.

"Done playing." Veiloria's eyes sharpened, and every trace of her earlier playfulness vanished.

The mont the werewolf launched himself at her again, claws less than half a foot from her face—

She moved.

No dazzling special effects. No earth-shaking display of power.

Just the simplest, most direct, most lethal thrust.

Under Veiloria's grip strength—far beyond any ordinary human's—and her exquisitely precise technique, the dry branch beca a true blade. It pierced with absolute accuracy through the gap between the werewolf's two claws and struck him dead center in his completely unguarded throat.

[Bone-Piercing Needle]

CRACK.

A faint, delicate sound—the shattering of a larynx.

The werewolf's savage forward montum froze. His crimson eyes filled with pure, disbelieving shock.

His mouth fell open, but only a wet, wheezing wheeze escaped. His massive body crashed to the ground and convulsed a few tis before going utterly still.

Silence reclaid the alley.

Veiloria tossed aside the branch—now faintly stained with blood—and rolled her wrist.

Landing a precise thrust of that caliber with a branch demanded extre control. Still, not bad—her feel for it hadn't deteriorated too much.

She had barely let out a breath of relief, about to go check on Ximilita, when—

"M-Master...?"

An impossibly faint, slurred murmur—thick with drowsiness and confusion—drifted over from the base of the wall.

Veiloria's whole body went rigid. She snapped her head around.

Ximilita, still slumped against the wall, had—at so point—cracked her eyes open the tiniest sliver. Her gaze was unfocused and hazy, as if she were struggling to fix it on Veiloria... or rather, on the upright, composed silhouette still holding the finishing stance.

There was confusion in that gaze. Dependence. And a faint trace of longing.

But only for an instant—then that tiny flicker went dark.

Ximilita's head lolled to one side, and she fell fully unconscious again, as if those words had been nothing but an involuntary murmur from within a dream.

Veiloria's heart hamred. She stood frozen, holding her breath for a long mont, until she confird that Ximilita's breathing had settled back into a deep, even rhythm. Only then did she slowly exhale.

‘Probably... didn't see anything, right? And even if she did, drunk as she is—she definitely won't rember when she wakes up.’

Veiloria told herself this, but a cold sweat had already broken out across her back.

‘Never getting careless like that again!’

She shook her head, clearing away the stray thoughts.

Veiloria walked over to the werewolf's corpse and crouched down.

"Waste is shaful," she murmured under her breath. A Vampire's instinctive craving for blood—sharpened by both the recent fight and extended "malnutrition"—was becoming difficult to suppress.

Besides, the werewolf's blood was almost certainly unpalatable, but as a Non-Human, his body held Arcane Energy and vitality far denser than any ordinary human's. In her current near-depleted state, that was nothing short of a lifeline.

She glanced both ways down the alley, confird it was empty at both ends, and quickly leaned down. Her sharp fangs pierced the artery on the side of the werewolf's neck.

Hot blood—thick with the rank, musky stench of a beast—flooded her throat. Veiloria wrinkled her nose and forced herself through the unpleasantness, swallowing quickly and efficiently.

The taste was, as expected, terrible—coarse, rancid, carrying the sll of wilderness and savagery. Nothing like the carefully processed and blended "Blood Brews" that Vampire nobility savored; it wasn't even as good as the cheap synthetic blood packs she'd been drinking lately.

"Ugh... disgusting." A few minutes later, Veiloria lifted her head, wiped the corner of her mouth, and grimaced.

The werewolf's blood had gone cold and thin; she'd extracted every useful part of it.

At least the results were imdiate.

A warm current spread outward from her stomach to her limbs. The weakness and gnawing hunger that had plagued her through weeks of low Arcane Energy dissipated rapidly. She was still far from her peak, but at least the dizziness was gone—she could feel strength flowing through her body once more.

Well. Half-full was better than empty.

With her "resupply" handled, Veiloria stared at the werewolf's massive corpse on the ground and found herself with a new problem.

She couldn't just leave it here. Co daybreak, it would cause a scene.

She thought for a mont, then heaved the body toward the deepest end of the alley and shoved it behind several enormous, foul-slling trash bins. She grabbed so discarded cardboard and torn rags and haphazardly piled them on top.

"This'll have to do for now. I'll co deal with it properly tomorrow."

Veiloria dusted off her hands and walked back to the base of the wall. She looked down at the still-sleeping Ximilita, let out a long sigh, and resigned herself to hoisting her onto her back once more.

This ti, her steps felt sohow lighter—whether from the energy she'd replenished, or from sothing else entirely, she couldn't say.

She quickened her pace toward her small, cramped Rented Room.