The Vampire’s Castle

To be honest, creating a character's name in the game had exhausted Qin Ruo's brain. When he first entered the character creation page of H&G, he did not know why he went nuts and misspelled his own name1. When combined with his surname, Qin, people may have misunderstood and thought that he despised the powerful, ancient Qin Dynasty. But the truth was he overlooked the two "Ruo" characters. Plus, the fact that in order for him to recreate the character, it would require another twenty four hours. Hence, he decided to just leave it be and he went forward with the misspelling.

After resting for more than an hour, Qin Ruo entered the game as his noisy ringtone sounded. The agreed meeting point was the same old place. He rushed to the location and managed to reach at 2 pm sharp. However, Scrooge Lady in her full set of Bowmaster equipment along with a Bandit, who looked like a high school girl appeared to have reached for quite some time.

The baby-faced Bandit seemed especially odd. She had been inspecting Qin Ruo from head to toe with a scrutinizing as well as a suspicious look from the moment she noticed his arrival. Her odd glare made Qin Ruo felt extremely uneasy.

This is the friend that Scrooge Lady mentioned? That Bandit who excels in Thievery? But why does she look like a student?

Although he felt bewildered, he remained polite.

"I'm sorry. You two must have waited for quite some time."

"Not really. You arrived just in time. Allow me to introduce you, this is the Level 41 Bandit that I mentioned before. She possesses the Advanced Thievery Skill, so there shouldn't be a problem for her to help you accomplish this mission." Little Kitten did not mind Qin Ruo's late arrival.

This introduction surprised Qin Ruo a bit—a Tier 4 Bandit who excelled in Advanced Thievery. However, the surprise did not stop there. What Little Kitten said next made Qin Ruo even more speechless.

"Don't you think we look alike? This is my sister, Li Xinqin. She's my biological sister, who's currently in the first year of her degree…"

"She's still studying?"

"Any problem with that?"

With dissatisfaction, the little girl talked back at the spur of the moment. Her attitude did not seem very friendly. She was displeased with Qin Ruo due to unknown reasons. Qin Ruo smiled and thought that she did have her sister's gene.

Little Kitten scoffed and raised her eyebrows as she smacked her sister on the head.

"Are you asking for trouble? Qin Ruo, please don't be bothered by her. This sister and her friends have been crazy about the game at school. They always behave like gangsters. She constantly yells 'fight' or 'kill' at home, every single day. If it wasn't to assist you on this mission, I wouldn't even be talking to her."

Qin Ruo remained speechless.

It was better if she did not mention the details. With this explanation, Qin Ruo now held a second opinion of her sister. Watching Xinqin's delicate appearance and carefree expression, it was hard to imagine that deep down, there was a certain beast in her.

Luckily she's not my sister.

Qin Ruo wiped cold sweat off his forehead. He began to doubt if they could complete the mission smoothly. He was unsure if the decision to bet this valuable opportunity on the "little gangster" was wise. After all, not everyone had the opportunity to accept this mission.

"Alright Sis, cut the crap since the both of you are from the same company. Hurry up with the mission. We still have something else to attend to later."

She stared at Qin Ruo after she completed her sentence. The inexplicable hostility caused the latter to shiver. Qin Ruo was once again bewildered. What had he done wrong to offend the little girl?

However, once he thought about the sincere help Little Kitten offered him, he was too embarrassed to continue arguing with Xinqin. He just assumed that she was acting up like a normal little girl.

"Alright, we won't delay any longer. Let's form a party and go to the nearest Rocke Town."

Once he partied up with the two of them, only then did Qin Ruo find out that the little girl's in-game name was Gold Digger Babe. Such a name… Ahem, genius.

Then, he turned to Little Kitten. She was at Level 39, which was unexpectedly higher than him. It appeared that she would soon upgrade to Tier 4 as well.

That's quite fast.

He believed that Scrooge Lady, like himself, spent a considerable amount of time after work to play the game. He wondered if she trained her level all by herself or did it together with her sister.

Besides, it was really difficult to overlap the Little Kitten before his eyes with her Scrooge Lady image in real life. This weird thought swirled around in Qin Ruo's mind.

***

Exiting Rocke Town, the three of them headed north and entered a desolate area near Vampire's Castle.

Low-tier Vampires lurked along the route. These were humans who had been infected by an Advanced Vampire after having their blood sucked. They transformed into Tier 2 or Tier 3 Vampires after that and hunted passersby mercilessly.

Sometimes, a Vampire would even look exactly like a player. Numerous negligent players were frequently caught off guard by such Vampires. After being bitten, they would eventually die without realizing...

In the instant they died, due to the Vampire's bite, their corpses would immediately turn into other Vampires, and Radiant Priests would not be able to revive them.

Therefore, certain players were forced to fight their own "corpse". It was an unspeakable, creepy scene for bystanders, especially when they had to witness a player facing his or her own bloody doppelganger.

However, this place had now become popular among players. Some even gathered and died there on purpose. This was to create a record of the battle between the two gangs—"the players" versus "their Vampire-selves". It would later be uploaded online to gain viewership.

Due to this reason, there were plenty of Tier 2 and Tier 3 players' seen along the route to Vampire's Castle. Qin Ruo's party successfully reached their destination without the need to fight much.

Dark clouds loomed over a magnificent, dark castle with 17th-century architecture. A bunch of black bats spanned their wings and surrounded the top of the castle. These elements embellished the castle, making it look like the haunted castles that usually appeared in Grimm's Fairy Tales.

The entry point of this mission was within the ancient, fairy-tale castle. The hidden mission and the map in hand could only be activated by dashing into the first underground level.

Gold Digger Babe seemed to be well-informed with the situation. When she found out that they had to go into the basement, she wrinkled her cute eyebrows a little and expressed a sense of disgust as well as uneasiness. She finally regained some of her feminine temperament.

"I should announce in advance! My sister just asked me to come here and solve the door mechanics. She never asked me to fight the monster, so I'm not going to get involved later on. Plus, I hate them, so you better not let those disgusting things near me…"

Qin Ruo nodded and smiled. If he was unable to diffuse such a problem, he would not have turned up. He immediately instructed the two ladies to stay behind him. After that, he took out a strange looking bottle from his backpack and unscrewed the cap. Then, he started to march into the creepy and mysterious Vampire's Castle.

"What's that?"

The two sisters behind him were obviously very curious when they saw Qin Ruo entering the castle without preparing a defensive magic cast. They could not help but catch up and ask.

Qin Ruo smiled mysteriously.

"Smell it yourself." He placed the bottle in front of them and the stench of garlic immediately choked them. Almost simultaneously, they covered their noses and backed a few meters away.

"It's so smelly! What is it?"

"It's garlic. Why are you holding this? Please throw it away quickly, it's so awful!" Little Kitten and Gold Digger Babe looked at the giggling Qin Ruo like he was some kind of lunatic.

"Throw it away?" Qin Ruo retrieved the bottle as though he was protecting a precious item.

"Then, what should I bring to lead you down the basement?"

Qin Ruo proceeded to tell the two sisters that he discovered it by chance in a mysterious little shop. The label on it claimed that it was brewed using the juice squeezed out from a thousand garlic cloves, which happened to be what the Vampires hated the most. Once opened, it was a guarantee that all low and high-tier Vampires would not dare to approach them for thirty minutes. After accepting this mission, he purposely bought two bottles of the concoction to try it out. The result was quite satisfactory.

"Really?"

Gold Digger Babe's eyes shone once she knew it was effective against the Vampires.

However, when she looked at the High-tier Vampires with wings on their back, she reserved the confidence she had in the little bottle. Only after they entered the hallway of the castle, where all the Vampires along the way had avoided them did she yell excitedly.

"Yeah! This is awesome! Brother Qin, where did you buy it?"

Qin Ruo almost dropped the bottle when he heard her call him "Brother Qin". He exclaimed a little inside.

"Why do you want to buy it?"

Little Kitten held back her urge to laugh and asked her sister.

The latter then realized that "Brother Qin" sounded very flirtatious. Her face flushed instantly like a tomato and she quickly changed the topic.

"Not long ago, I received a mission related to Vampires, such a nuisance! But, it's great now, Bro… Qin Ruo. Where can I buy this garlic juice?"

Watching the shy expression on the young girl's face, Qin Ruo nodded his head. It was rare for her to behave so feminine. "After this mission, I'll lead you to it."

"That's a deal!"

Gold Digger Babe was excited. This amused Qin Ruo and he could not stop laughing. That mission had to be very important to her.

As he relaxed, out of nowhere, Gold Digger Babe blurted out a world-shattering sentence, "Great, since you've helped me, I'll therefore reluctantly allow you to go after my sister."

"What?!"

"Xinqin!"

Little Kitten was embarrassed and angry at the same time. Maybe she was used to it, so she carelessly raised the bow in her hand and smacked her sister on the head with it. As a result, she accidentally knocked the bottle in Qin Ruo's hand…

The shattering sound of the glass bottle was exceptionally clear in the silent Vampire's Castle!