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“Make sure you’ve packed up everything by nightfall” Lucy instructed as she gave her flawless visage a once over in her vanity mirror, “and make sure you burn anything we don’t need, no point in bringing along useless baggage. Ooh- most importantly make sure you take care of that matter of the ships Ill be back a bit later tonight maybe, but I’ll give you the gold now. Understood?”

 

“Yes, yes master just shutter those windows over there please!” Sera drowsily nodded her as she cowered in a corner of the large room.

 

It went without saying, that today was a huge day for Lucy.

 

Along with finally becoming the owner of her own fleet of ships, she would be picking up her new group of slaves, and adding a new member to her ranks of vampiric progeny today. She was ecstatic to see so many of her long-term plans finally coming to fruition, but she still had a lot of loose ends to be tied and no Mars to run daylight errands for her until tomorrow.

 

As such Lucy has had to lean on Sera a bit more for some assistance, and while she trusted her progeny with any life-or-death mission,  she wasn’t sure if Sera could handle business matters as gracefully.

 

“Oops my apologies I sometimes forget you don’t have immunity to sunlight haha” said Lucy as she seemed to glide across the room and rapidly shutter the windows, “don’t worry darling live along enough and you will”

 

“Whew thank you master!”

 

 “And here’s the gold you’ll need and remember you’re purchasing 3 vessels for Lucy Nyx. Now I must be off I’ll be back by nightfall maybe but definitely in enough time for us to leave tomorrow”

 

“Lucy Nyx got it. Oh master, you’re off to turn that knight, right? Hmm I wonder what type of vampire he’ll become…”

 

Upon hearing Sera’s statement Lucy had to suppress a chuckle at the back of her throat. She felt it was painfully obvious that the 8’0 tall  knight would become a Templar type vampire. The change only amplified what natural gifts a person had before they’d become a vampire.

 

“Among some other errands yes, I am going to turn him, I think it’s time we expand the clan. And truthfully, I don’t care what type he turns out as I’m just happy for the extra manpower but, I’m sure he’ll become the perfect Templar vampire knight.”

 

After saying her piece, Lucy once again bid a farewell for now before heading out to start her day.

 

                                                                        …

 

Immediately after leaving her inn Lucy decided she should try to head to Grimsby early. She still had some matters to take care of herself before meeting Nox and she thought it best to get them done right away.

 

 As such she went directly to the  Merchant’s Strait, which was a dirt road that connected the two towns, and made her way towards a secluded area of the strait to prepare to take flight.

 

In the beginning when Lucy first grew her pair of wings it took quite some practice to get used to having and using them, especially in public. Luckily they were easily retractable and flying soon came natural to her after a couple practice sessions over some weeks.

 

Rolling her shoulders and neck Lucy slowly began to slowly extend the meters long set of vampire bat like wings but soon stopped rather suddenly

 

‘Someone’s coming down the road!’ she realized thanks to her enhanced vampiric senses

 

Shortly after soon the unmistakable sound of hooves beating against the ground began to resound as a small dust cloud approached Lucy from farther down the strait. From where she was observing it appeared to Lucy that her unexpected visitors were a pair of travelers as she could only make out  a pair of horses with no major cargo or a carriage, however as the duo got closer and closer a few tell-tale signs soon made Lucy privy to the identity of at least one of the fellows.

 

“Wait… I’d recognize that bright golden armor anywhere. What’s Nox doing here? And why is he heading into Port Blackwood?” Lucy wondered to herself as the horses and their dirt cloud steadily approached

 

Soon enough Lucy received her answer as the sight of Nox on horseback next to a man dressed in traditional priest wear became clear to see.  

“Halt!” Nox’s deep and masculine voice rang out, startling and stopping the pair of horses at once, “Give me one moment Father”

 

Then in one smooth movement he hopped off the back of the rather huge horse and with just two long strides stood looking down at Lucy.

 

“Well what a pleasant surprise” said Lucy with a cheeky smirk as she craned her neck to look the half giant in his eyes, “ I guess the evening was too far away for you”

 

“Haha this is quite a pleasant surprise. When I first saw that familiar red cloak I couldn’t believe my eyes, I knew it had to be you. B-But what are you doing way out here? Headed somewhere?”

 

Lucy suppressed an eye roll as she looked down at her noticeably red ensemble before replying, “Yeah I’m just on my way to run some last minute errands, but I think I could ask you the same…

 

At that moment Lucy peeked from behind Nox’s hulking shoulder to gesture at the priest on horseback some feet away when suddenly he looked up as well and the two made eye contact. For a moment the priest had a look of excitement and disbelief on his face before it morphed into a one of disappointment, but in that moment Lucy felt a chill down her spine

 

Just who was this strange priest? And why did he make her so uneasy?

 

“Oh Father Cleary? Yeah he’s just here for some official kingdom business” Nox explained, “ I’m just escorting him into town so he can pray for and bless some of the commoners, but we can meet up right afterw-“

 

“Excuse me milady?” the old priest suddenly approached and interrupted out of nowhere, “God has truly blessed you with beauty hehe. Almost inhuman-Oh! My apologies I haven’t even introduced myself I’m Father Cleary and I just have to say, A beautiful young woman such as yourself shouldn’t be traveling alone. I couldn’t help but overhear and I just can’t let you make that trip to Grimsby by yourself. There are far too many bandits roaming about nowadays. Here why don’t you take my knight escort, it appears you two have some history together plus I can already see the Port from here. What do you two say?”

 

In the face of such generosity Lucy was slightly perturbed but she wasn’t going to look a gift horse in it’s mouth’. In all honesty her plan was to get the knight alone as soon as possible anyway so after recovering her wits she responded with a prompt,

 

 “That sounds delightful, doesn’t it Nox?”

 

“Y-Yeah of course if it’s truly okay I think it would be my pleasure, uh , Father Cleary if you just follow this road along the rest of the way you’ll reach Port Blackwood in the time it takes an incense stick to burn”

 

After bidding him farewell Father Cleary quickly left leaving the pair where they’d met on the dirt road.

 

“Should we head to Grimsby now?” asked Nox, “I believe they have a training area there we could use or-“

 

“I know a place, just follow me” Lucy commanded smirking slightly as she led the knight off the trail, “it’s just up ahead between these trees…”

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