Second Genesis

Whatever banter Grey and Amunet had fell to silence the moment they stepped out of the room. A howling wind swept by, causing them to both look toward their backs, but there was nothing at all there.

Velvety crimson curtains that lined the walls danced up before settling back down. However, as focused as they were on the potential of incoming enemies, there were none. Instead, they met a fork in the road.

They looked toward one another.

"Always go right?" Grey suggested.

Amunet shrugged and they did exactly that.

Grey took a peek at his map to see if it would update, but it was covered by a black fog. In that case there was only one way to do this. Rather than just guessing, they’d go the same way every time.

Halfway toward yet another fork, though, Grey’s steps suddenly stopped.

"What’s wrong?" Amunet whispered.

"You don’t feel that?" Grey said in a low tone.

"No."

Grey’s gaze flickered. It felt like something was pressing on his mind. It was very faint, but if he pushed just a little bit...

—

[Lv1 Mental Fortitude > Lv2 Mental Fortitude]

—

Grey’s mind suddenly cleared as though a thin veil had been lifted from his eyes. When his vision brightened, he found himself walking in the opposite direction he thought he was.

’Shit. Is there another illusion down here? I almost missed it.’

"Focus." He said. "There’s an illusion active down here. We were almost walking in circles."

"Focus? What do you mean?"

Grey didn’t really know how to explain so he fell into silence for a moment.

"Do you know how to sense your Neural Frame?" he asked.

"Yes." Amunet nodded.

"Look for a thin veil over your eyes then push against it."

Amunet fell into silence herself after hearing this. It was a full two minutes before she spoke again.

"Holy shit..." she whispered. "I just got an Illusion Dispelling Mind Combat Method. Thanks."

Grey raised an eyebrow. That wasn’t what he was expecting her to get, but whatever it was, it worked.

"It drained one stamina point, though." She said a bit bitterly. If she had to use up a stamina point every time she dispelled an illusion, she’d be a dead woman walking by the time they got out of this place.

"I don’t think there’s another layer for now. Let’s move forward."

Amunet nodded and they moved until they were standing in front of a familiar fork in the road. Once again, they went right.

This time, however, there was a shift in the hallway and the temperature plummeted.

Grey was a bit distracted looking for an enemy when he noticed Amunet about to turn around and head back the way they came.

"Wake up." He hissed.

Amunet jolted and her feet stopped. The scene before them opened up into a hollow cave.

She was about to say something when Grey held up a finger to his lips and pointed.

Out ahead of them was a sheer cliff to what must have been a 30 meter plummet toward jagged rocks. Stalactites hung above. Attached to their pointed tips were chains that dangled a series of coffins that swayed back and forth in the winds.

It almost looked like it was by design, almost like there were babies being rocked to sleep on the inside.

Despite the odd thought, the coffins were certainly not large enough for any full sized humans.

’Don’t tell me this instance is going to have us fighting a bunch of baby vampires.’ Grey almost wanted to laugh, but the scene down below was much less funny.

A real vampire sat on a throne. Though, it was hard to tell if he was more pimp than vampire or not.

He certainly had the steely pale grey skin and knife-like canines going for him. He was also handsome to a near unreasonable degree, right down to his gelled, slicked back hair.

However, he was also wearing a black suit that seemed more suited for a member of the mafia, the red dress shirt he matched it with opened up with one button too many to reveal a yellow gold Cuban link chain.

Hanging from the chain was an iced out fang that Grey felt was almost... chilly for some reason. It was beyond the meme or irony of it all, he truly felt cold just looking at it.

As though to complete the look, he held a black cane instead of resting his right hand on the arm rest of his throne like his left was. The head of this cane was equally iced out. But Grey couldn’t see it clearly enough to tell if it also gave off the same chilly air.

The vampire pimp wasn’t the only problem, though.

Across from his throne was the silhouette of a woman hidden beneath heavy green and violet robes. A rope tied almost too tightly around her waist, accentuating her curves.

"Now that’s a big ass." Grey whispered. "If yours isn’t at least that big I’m filing a lawsuit for false advertisement."

Amunet didn’t answer. She couldn’t seem to joke in the current situation nearly as well.

Both of the characters down below were giving off a dangerous air. If there was just one of them, maybe they could manage. But two of them?

"Esmeralda, your kind is not welcome here."

A voice that was somehow both sultry and overly masculine echoed from the vampire pimp.

"To think a member of the Dark Kin would dare say such words to me."

"Consider it interest for the generations of arrogance. The world is no longer that of the witches’. The Dark Kin are very much used to wading in the shadows, you will have to learn how to float all on your own."

"And if I refuse to go so quietly?"

The vampire pimp laughed, the booming waves causing the baby coffins to sway wildly, smashing against one another.

One swung for Grey’s head and he just barely dodged out of the way, but his sudden movement caused a rock to fall from the ledge they peered over.

BANG.

The coffin slammed into the wall by Grey, but it did nothing to blunt the impact of the falling rock.

Both vampire and witch looked up in unison.

’Shit.’