Undying Warlord

From the beginning, Dilan knew that there might be Vampires, who had been forcefully turned. However, he didn't expect to encounter someone like James Blake even before infiltrating the Blood Legion's base.

"Even if some of the ordinary Vampires in the Blood Legion might be good people, the moment they receive orders from their master, they switch to behaving like the mindless marionettes they have been turned into," Williams said, looking at Kuhn, who was staring at the lifeless head of James Blake with a complex expression.

"I know…I know that…." Kuhn was currently trying to arrange his thoughts but it was more difficult than expected.

From the moment he had turned into an Ascender, he was fully aware that he would have to fight humans. In an apocalypse, where the laws of the jungle applied, and humans were valuable resources that allowed one to become extremely fast and extremely strong, this was an obvious outcome.

There were no normal laws anymore, and the society that had worked out perfectly fine before had been destroyed.

Nonetheless, at the sight of the headless corpse of James Blake, an innocent human being, who had forcefully been turned into a vampire, and forced to do unimaginable things, he couldn't hold in his breakfast.

He turned around and threw up on the ground as a wave of nausea overwhelmed him.

"This is so unfair…" He could be heard mumbling, and Dilan could only agree.

It was unfair, but so was life. Life has never been fair, Dilan knew this very well.

He ignored Kuhn's behavior, collected James Blake's Blood Essence, and absorbed it.

[<Silver> Blood Essence of Tier-1 Level 21 Blood Varian Assassin(Vampire) has been absorbed → +0.2 Strength, +1.8 Health, +0.1 Stamina, +0.5 Agility, +0.1 Mana]

The Essence that flushed his body was highly potent. It swept through his veins and invigorated his entire body. Dilan noticed a big difference from before.

The Silver Blood Essence was much more potent than the Bronze Blood Essence. However, that was only obvious. James Blade had also been at a higher level than the other Vampire.

All of this was interesting, but Dilan noticed something particular, which he hadn't noticed when he first devoured a Blood Essence.

"The Blood Essence of Vampires doesn't fill the Essence pool." He said all of a sudden, attracting everyone's attention. However, Williams was the most intrigued of them all because he understood the importance of Dilan's statement.

"So you mean you would never level up no matter how many Blood Essences you devour? Yet, you still get stats?" He asked, his excitement clearly perceptible.

Dilan smiled before nodding his head.

"Exactly."

Williams clenched his fist in excitement as he gave Dilan a knowing smile.

The fact that Blood Essences gave stats but no ordinary Essence for the Essence pool could be considered a disadvantage in many situations.

However, if one were to level up too quickly, it was difficult to increase one's stats. Right now, most Tier-1 Ascenders in Dilan's group were between Level 14 to 19. As for the stats they could gain after a full day of hunting, they would be lucky if their gains exceeded 1 Unit of stats points.

The higher one's level in comparison to the monsters they faced, the lower the Essence they received, and the lower the stats they would gain. In fact, being five levels higher than their opponent would usually result in not gaining any status points, with the sole exception being that their opponent had been a Gold Tier-1 monster.

Silver Tier-1 monster Essences would occasionally reward some status points, but the gains wouldn't be worth the effort of hunting a powerful Silver Tier-1 monster, even if it was five levels lower than oneself.

That was also why many Ascenders were currently struggling to become stronger. Their level was high but their stats were in no way comparable to their high level.

They had been too greedy to level up and neglected something even more important; the focus on their foundation, their stats!

"In that case, what are we waiting for? Let's kill these motherfuckers!" Williams was motivated. Since Dilan had clearly shown them how dangerous Vampires were, Williams swore to himself that he wouldn't show any hesitation to kill them all.

There were humans in the Blood Legion, but they had already pushed past their humanity. To Williams, they were already considered monsters. As for Ailee, Oliver, and the two others' mental states, they had to come to a consensus.

Ailee was more than fine with killing her opponents. She already knew how to kill Vampires, even if she was using a bow and arrow that wouldn't usually kill Vampires even if their brain was pierced.

As for Oliver, he was still a bit hesitant but his excitement and battle spirit had mostly overwhelmed his hesitation.

Dilan's behavior, when they were hunting together, had influenced Oliver, and he slowly became accustomed to the delicious taste of a beautiful battlefield!

Silas was mostly silent but he had also sworn to himself that he would kill the Vampires and that he would become much stronger. From Dilan's reaction after absorbing both Blood Essences, and Williams' reaction in accordance to Dilan's comment, he could tell that the Blood Essences were valuable and very useful to become stronger.

He couldn't allow anyone else to take away his opportunity, even if that meant that he would have to give up his innocence and kill other humans!

Kuhn looked like he had calmed down, but everyone knew that it was just a matter of time before he would enter a state of panic once again.

However, the next time it was bound to happen, Kuhn would be in the middle of a battlefield. He would have to come to a conclusion on whether he would kill his opponents or if he would allow others to trample over him and kill him like he was a pig that was raised for slaughter.

Dilan would have loved to be of any help for Kuhn, but he knew that the young Ascender and many others had to learn much more about the world Milarn had turned into, and what awaited them.

Right now, Dilan just wanted to show the five, who were with him, and what they needed to have in order to survive on Milarn!

"Well, let's follow my plan. I thought about something. We don't want anyone in our team to die after all, right?" Dilan smiled, but his eyes gleamed dangerously.

In a matter of minutes, Dilan shared what was on his mind and as there was nobody to come up with a better plan, they did what Dilan intended.

Less than half an hour later, Dilan found himself in front of the military base the Blood Legion had captured.

He was all by himself, and there was nobody around him.

The Blazing Serpentine Blade glimmered brightly as Dilan slashed it to the side, cutting through the concrete on the ground.

A moment later he used a bit of mana to activate [Thunder Step]. However, instead of using an entire unit of mana, Dilan used too little mana to properly activate the ability. But that was not his plan, either way.

With each step Dilan took, thunderous noises originating from Dilan resounded through the area. He made his appearance clearly known with the loud booming voice that could be heard everywhere.

Not a single existence in a radius of a kilometer was able to ignore the thunderous sounds he created. An arrogant smile was displayed on Dilan's face as he made his way to the fence of the military base.

With a single swipe of his arm, the Blazing Serpentine Blade enlarged, tearing open the entire face in front of him.

"Ahhh, this will be fun. I can smell it. Your fear. Entertain me a little bit, Blood Legion…don't disappoint me. Let's play a bit!"