Red Mask, White Cloak

After some time that they were drinking, none of them spoke a word. Renji wasn't a talkative person when he wasn't drunk, Lucien enjoyed his blood wine, and Uta was just Uta. Thinking about some kind of art or about something else. Not understandable to us mortals.

Itori was looking at the three of them, and she didn't like this silence. Compared to her cheerful and funny nature, this serious and heavy air was killing her slowly. But when it appeared that she had lost all hope, the person who was usually cold as the ice started to talk.

"Your name sounds very special. Etras di Aeon. Are you some kind of noble or something similar?"

Asked Renji.

In his entire life, he didn't hear about some Noble House of Ghouls. Of course, some rich families existed, such as Tsukiyama Family, and he knew about only one Noble House of Ghouls. They originated from Germany, and their name was Rosenwald Family; they are connected with Tsukiyama Family by blood.

But this family was exterminated by Washuu Matsuri around ten years ago, during the so-called Rosenwald Extermination Operation.

"You could consider me an aristocrat."

Answered Lucien truly. Even an idiot could deduce from his name that he was some kind of nobility, so there wasn't any point in denial. After that, Lucien spent there more than an hour before leaving. When nobody was watching, Itori gave Lucien a small piece of paper that was marked at a certain location.

This was a location where ghouls were gathering in 14th Ward. In this Ward, cannibalism was very common. Lucien needed some bodies to refine them to blood essences, so he asked Itori about the best place where to find bigger numbers of ghouls. Most of those ghouls would be only B-Rated, and the minority would be A-Rated.

He decided to give Itori one blood essence. It would help her to increase her RC Level, and she could grow stronger.

***

It took over one hour for Lucien to arrive at the marked location on foot. It was an abandoned underground metro. At least part of it. It was devastated, and everywhere was the smell of blood and cheap alcohol. Lucien just frowned at looking at the entrance, which looked like it would collapse every second now.

He then just overcame himself and proceeded to the depths of the metro.

Soon he found his target. Or better said targets. In a huge underground space, several ghouls were feeding on some corpses. Lucien quickly scanned the ghouls present. There were around twenty of them, and most of them looked rather weak.

Lucien materialized several daggers from kagune, and through his telekinesis, he started a massacre down there. When one dagger was slashed, one life of a ghoul was extinguished. After several minutes of intense slaughter and panic, none of those ghouls were left alive.

Lucien was rather disappointed because all of these ghouls were only of B-Rated. He needed to go deeper into this complex to find at least A-Rated ghouls or maybe even S-Rated ghouls.

Lucien stored the bodies of twenty-five ghouls in his Cross Crest and then proceeded deeper into the underground complex.

Cross Crest was a function of the Game he unlocked, and it was basically a pocket dimension that allowed him to store a limited number of things.

He was walking through some kind of tunnel until he heard some weird sound. Lucien immediately turned on his kakugan and congealed three tails as his kagune. The attack came out of nowhere and aimed at Lucien, but he swiftly blocked the enemy's kagune attack with his own kagune.

As he was blocking the attack, Lucien congealed another two tails from his kagune and attacked his ghoul who had ambushed him. The ghoul was a bit stronger than the previous ones, but he still lost an arm to attack Lucien's kagune tails.

This ghoul was a man, and he wasn't even wearing the mask. Lucien then looked at him as he was crouching on the floor in pain as his arm was severed.

"Weak."

Lucien then attacked once more, severing the ghoul's head in the process. He stored the corpse in Cross Crest and then chose to proceed deeper as he had a feeling that there may be more powerful ghouls here. Lucien had a faint feeling that this place may lead to the 24th Ward.

When Lucien walked around another twenty minutes, he found a somewhat big open space. This space was a rather big counting fact that this was underground. Lucien looked around himself only to see that he was alone there.

He didn't see any other ghouls or humans.

This place looked really simple. There wasn't even one single graffiti on the walls or trash around. It was clear that this place was out of reach of people.

Lucien walked through this place until he saw a person.

He was a tall man with short white hair and red eyes. His mouth was hidden with a red iron mask, and he was wearing a white cloak. Lucien observed this man as he knew who he was and knew that he was probably stronger than him by some amount.

"Greetings Tatara, Direct Subordinate of Leader of Aogiri Tree and remnant of Chi She Lian."

Bowed Lucien in his pre-learned manner. Tatara was the Direct Subordinate of the Aogiri Tree and SS-Rated ghoul.

Originating from China, he was the only living member of the ghoul organization in Chine named Chi She Lian, which was headed by his brother Yan, but this was already the past.

Tatara observed Lucien and didn't say anything. The person is very loyal to the Aogiri Tree and is an extremely powerful individual. He was a very composed and stoic person and an experienced warrior. What was rather frightening about him was the accuracy of his calculation and precision during fights.

"You know me, but I don't know you."

Said Tatara with an indifferent voice. As a warrior tempered by the blood of other ghouls and humans, he could say that man before he was strong.

"Lucien Etras di"

Lucien stopped in the middle of his introduction as he jumped into the air because Tatara's kagune was already before him. It looked like a large, thick blood-red tail with a spearhead on its end. Tatara was just probing Lucien about how strong he really was.

It was known that Tatara had inhuman agility and speed.

"How rude interruption."

Stated Lucien. In reality, he wasn't particularly offended because he knew that this was just a test. He knew that Tatara was testing him to see if he was really qualified to talk on the same grounds as him. But still, Lucien didn't like this, so he did the same.

Three kagune tails appeared behind his back and attacked Tatara with thunderous speed. Tatara managed to dodge the first two, and the last one was aiming at his chest. However, it was blocked with the usage of kakuja, which has materialized around his arm only.

Both of them looked at each other and, at the same time, came to a mutual understanding and turned off their kakugan. Then two of them came closer and bowed to each other as a symbol of respect. It was recognition of warrior to warrior. Martial artist to martial artist.

"Lucien Etras di Aeon, my name is."

Lucien was finally able to introduce himself properly. Tatara nodded his head, apparently a faintly familiar name. However, he wasn't able to recognize it now; only after several seconds was he finally able to remember who man before him. But not based on the name but rather an unusual appearance.

"Now I know your name. In certain circles, valuable information is flowing that man of a rather unusual appearance arrived in Tokyo and killed three agents of Vasuki in a flash, like a toying with children."

Said Tatara with a somewhat happy voice. From his perspective, the more enemies CCG, Washuu Clan, or V had, the better. He heard about the man from Eto two days after the event.