CHAPTER 4 — THE VAMPIRE

“Attack!”

The Carrion General’s static command split the air, and the choir heed his charge.

A thousand throats split open in a serrated chorus tearing through the Endless Expanse. The ground blackened beneath their shadows as they lifted off in unison, a tide of blackened wings blotting out the pale light above. As if there was a collapse of gravity itself, the sky had turned into the wrathful plague and I was stranded in the undertow.

Their bodies tumbled and spun with no regard for formation, yet together they formed a stormfront of talons. They dove, spiraling like tridents, their song condensing into a single, impossible note that vibrated against the sands. Such was their cold, menacing entrance against only one foe—and all I did was reject them.

What pieces of work these birds were.

I still haven’t figured out if this was the afterlife or an isekai. After falling that hard, I have to fight. Endless Expanse, being turned into a faceless bird, well, these concepts do prove to be of interest—but I like the fangs still intact. Thanks but—I respectfully decline.

Not that they see the respect.

Well, then.

I cracked my knuckles, and bared my fangs.

I’m no expert at retaliations.

I’m usually the initiator in combat, so I don’t have anything nuanced for a counteraction.

Only a straightforward, malformed stance born out of panic—feet uneven, fists tight to the point of snapping bone. My back arched like a cornered beast rather than a warrior. And still, I braced for the sky to fall.

Channeling energy from the hind, I launched myself through the first wave—cutting a ragged seam through their offensive. I twisted in the air, shoulder into sternum, elbow into wing joint. I used their momentum against them, a crude but effective inversion—where they poured weight, I redirected it. I stayed on the air, rolled, and turned; the motion was ugly and imprecise.

Yet I caught a carrion by the neck.

The choir faltered like a scratched record.

For a blessed second, there’s nothing but the dirt rubbing against my palms and the sonorous pant of the carrion I snatched from the flock.

Enough to buy me a thought.

“Look, there are thousands of you,” I said, though looking up at all of them, meaning to condescend. “I’d rather not be charged for genocide.”

This was a bluff, nonetheless. I said so because saying things was cheaper than bleeding again and gain. A moral plea sounded better than being caught of fright against them—which, to tell the truth, I imagined having nightmares of them as soon as the impromptu war would have ended. Say, my voice stayed smooth—too smooth—while my brain did the real work: counting wings, testing distances, looking for the one gap a man with two good legs could exploit.

And well, the Carrion shrieked right at my face, breaking out into all of them.

Nothing but hostilities were felt, with none heeding the warning at all.

“Okay…Then so be it.”

I ripped the bird’s neck.

This was to set an example.

Hunger wasn’t reacting at this point, but I had the urge to at least a meal out of them. You know, I might as well be sustained to reward myself of being in the farce. I lost a lot from the fall so I might as well.

But reality was rather harsh.

“Oh…” I gasped, even if fairly slight.

What I felt instead was different—a chemical coldness under my palms where the carrion’s throat pulsed, I pressed, the neck caved, something wet and slick slipped between my fingers, and for one irrational flash, I remember being a human who couldn’t handle to sight of a hen being strangled. I also used to work with chemicals as a human.

No, it’s not blood.

Liquid nitrogen.

It evaporated as soon as it escaped out of its skin.

How disappointing… but I couldn’t even lament at that discovery as the Carrions surged.

The sky shivered alongside their atrocious wings.

They swarmed like a storm and took the shape of vanity and greed, maybe even a hint of vengeance for their fallen singer. I jumped, piercing through them once again, pivoting, like a blade of practiced brutality, and took each apart in the way you take apart a complicated clock. Limbs, teeth, the glow of their fluids spilling out like oil—it was all so clean.

Rinse and repeat, until one by one, they fell down the ground.

More of a one-sided annihilation than a proper clash.

Like you’re mowing mobs in an MMO—and I know you know what I mean.

Only after a moment, when I felt I wasn’t gaining anything anymore, I glanced up. Gawking all tired and put into utter derision. I looked at the general—though best I tag him as the Carrion Conductor. It might have been my fault for raising the flag.

“You’re too calm, looking at all your peewees being overpowered,” I said, sneering at his

“Heh. Unleash the Symphony,” he ordered after a shred of scoff, none the sight of intimidation nor, oddly, acknowledging the overpowering presence I’ve cast upon them.

“Unleash… Is that your plan?” I mocked him. “Sing me to death, my dear, desperate conductor?”

He tilted his head. “Not to death,” he chimed as coldly as the Siberian frost. “To remake who you are.”

Without any regards to my already tolled mind, the said Symphony began.

An entire orchestra assembled out of nothing.

Phantom violins that drew long, keening lines through the air. Rusted trumpets bled thin, metallic tones as a percussion tapped to the malicious beat. Their music bent the sand and tightened around the Conductor. Lifting his hands, all the Carrions’ shrieks threaded into a devilish philharmonic, a monstrous score that filled the expanse.

Bodies that had been broken began to twitch.

The earth exhaled and disgorged shapes—armored shells splitting, broken necks and limbs knitting into perverse new rhythms.

Each rising corpse found its place in the score as if it had rehearsed for centuries.

The rising.

For fuck’s sake—the rising.

The birds peeled themselves from the earth like secondhand skins.

Their eyes were empty, yes, but in that vacancy there was a patient hunger that wasn’t for blood. It was for cadence, for structure, for the remaking of one insolent vampire to fit into their choir. From the laughter of vanity, all from seeing the orchestra resurrect all of those I killed, the probability of being eaten alive—or call it their baptism—raised from slim to an exponentially high rate. Seriously, I felt the sweat drip from my forehead.

Yeah, I'd admit and not make a clown of myself.

As I expected, I was too ignorant of this setting.

For a moment, I wished I didn’t do anything rash as to throw myself under the sun. Maybe I could trace the regret back to when I followed the vampire at that dark street. Regret piled, I could only bring out one exasperated sigh to how this turned not in my favor.

Talk about bad taste.

Their voices stabbed into my skull, filling it with noise until my thoughts weren’t my own.

“Join us. Join us. Join us.” Annoyingly so, I clapped my hands over my ears.

Their song wasn’t sound anymore—it was inside, rattling bones and ensnaring every nerves from inside out.

The air changed—not with sound but with the overpowering stench of fear.

The choir hummed softer, their notes turning into threads that braid around the seedlings of memory in my skull. Images flickered, of cities erased, blood like ink washing out letters, names I’ve held dear unmaking themselves into scores.

If I’d not kept a relatively high mental fortitude, I could have been lumped into their mindless network. I sighed...Yeah, suppose so, I still didn't like the thought of being a faceless bird draped in all shades of black. “Well,” I exclaimed, very small, and then very loud. “That’s a problem!”

Only I could do was release the best trump card up my sleeve.

“Tactical retreat!” I yawped—gnarly devoid of flairs and smokescreen but a good ol' fashioned sprint.