I Became A Zompirewolf

In a flash, a week passed. Ashton's plans had advanced considerably in the days that followed. Ricochet, with the help of Giholo engineers, successfully managed to get one of their ships to working condition.

Albeit unsafe for space travel, there shouldn't be any problems with the ship as long as they don't try to escape the atmosphere. They even managed to scrounge up enough fuel for two trips around the planet.

Back in Vania, the rebellious nobles had reinforced their loyalty to Alucard, just like Ashton had predicted. The nobility had tried to confirm the news of Ashton's return and victory through 'spies' living in Livan, and that was why it took a week for them to clear their stance.

As for Lycania, Sheera and her soldiers finally reestablished the connection with Livan and received news of Ashton's return. They were elated and rushed back home to meet their lord.

Sheera wasn't the only one who wanted to meet with Ashton as counsel from Vania also arrived to discuss 'geopolitical' matters with him.

However, by the time they arrived, Ashton was already on his way to Nirvana. All they could do now was to wait for his return and meanwhile enjoy Giholan services offered.

***

A month later...

In a dimly lit alleyway stood a lone woman covered in the rotten blood of her pursuers. Like her, the walls surrounding her now had a touch of blood over them. While the rain above tried its best to cleanse the horrific sight.

Having nothing else to do, the woman began looting her pursuers and found a fairly dry cigarette. Having been an avid smoker, the sight of vintage cigarettes caused her to smile, a rare event for someone like her.

After piling up the corpses under the shade of a balcony, she sat on top of them before lighting the cancer stick and having the time of her life. Living as a human in Fright city, these moments were never taken for granted.

Not by Alina, at the least.

In whatever bit of light the alley had to offer, an engraving could be seen on her half-shaven head.

'04'

It read, identifying her as a test subject. The vampires weren't the only ones experimenting on humans, and the undead were way ahead in researching and testing the humans.

Their research successfully turned humans into powerful beings with a variety of powers. Some were so frightening that those humans were either turned into the undead to control the abilities they had or killed.

Alina seemed to be one such test subject who managed to escape from the clutches of the undead, carrying a power that no undead would want to cross.

It was the second day since her escape from one such research facility, codenamed: Tartarus. Alina was the fourth human who successfully accepted the augmentation and the first to escape from the facility.

The ones before her either pledged loyalty to the undead or were killed. She was presented with the same offer but chose the third option and made a break for it.

Escape wasn't easy, especially with 'Chasers' on her tail. But thanks to her ability, she managed to get rid of them and have a peaceful smoking break, which seemed to have run out.

'It was more likely they were kept for further experimentation,' Alina thought while crushing the cigarette butt, 'I should probably get some clothes. Walking around naked will garner unwanted attention.'

Thankfully, she did not have to look far to get something to wear. After all, she was conveniently sitting over a pile of clothes if one ignored the corpses attached to them.

"Tsk, tasteless fuckers don't even have proper duds."

Alina put some clothes on while two strangers watched her from afar.

"She's quite a... piece," Anna remarked.

"Oh, is the succubus acting up all of a sudden?" Ashton joked, "But I agree, she is somewhat special."

"Stop drooling over yourself." Anna turned Ashton's face towards hers, "I'm the queen of lust here, so behave yourself."

"That's not what you said last night," Ashton whispered in her ear as she grabbed Anna in his arms, "But, point taken."

It had been three-and-a-half weeks since they landed on the artificially constructed coastal town known as Fright city. Unlike the rest of Nirvana, Fright city wasn't entirely dominated by the undead.

Around twenty per cent of the city's population consisted of humans. Mainly to ensure an endless supply of humans for various purposes, a fraction of humans were allowed to live normally in the city, with conditions.

As long as the humans reproduce to hand over one child to the 'Council', they can continue living as usual. But failing to do so even once would result in them being taken away instead of the children.

How did Ashton get all this information?

The answer to it would be his acting skills. After hiding their ship, Ashton began posing as an 'inquisitor' who had arrived from the capital to clear some urgent matter, and Anna was his human slave/assistant.

No one questioned them because it wasn't all that uncommon for situations like these to happen in Fright City.

Their main goal was to access Tartarus and gather information about Jonathan, Ashton's father, as he was brought to the same facility after being given away to the undead.

However, despite the best of their efforts, the duo could not locate Tartarus. It was a well-hidden secret not everyone knew about, and those who did refuse to speak about it.

When it seemed that luck hadn't entirely abandoned them yet, and through the grapevine Ashton had cultivated over the weeks, he learned about an escapee from Tartarus.

Upon putting his tracking skills to the test, Ashton quickly found Alina. But he wasn't the only one who found her as a dozen men kept chasing her through the alleyways.

The duo was about to help her when they saw an interesting sight.

Just as it looked, Alina had her fate sealed; her pursuers turned on each other. A couple of minutes later, Alina was the only one left standing, and the interaction made it clear why Tartarus was so dead set on getting her back.

"What should we do, though?" Anna crossed her arms in front of her chest, "It's not like we can go and ask her, 'Hey! Could you point us to the place where they tortured you for god knows how long?'"

"We won't need to ask her anything," Ashton smirked, "She'll tell us herself."