My Blood Legacy: Bloodlines

Chapter 145: It’s time to put an end to this.

Victor only stopped when the last red line vanished behind him.

The forest around him was unrecognizable. Ancient trunks had been split in half, some cut apart by shockwaves, others crushed by poorly controlled discharges of Black Lightning. The smell of burned blood, shattered ice, and freshly split wood hung suspended in the air, forming a heavy, metallic mixture that seemed to cling to the throat. Masked corpses were scattered in different directions, some whole enough to be recognized as vampires, others reduced to broken shapes that only confirmed something alive had been there before.

Victor took one deep breath, then let the air out slowly.

His body hurt.

Not in a worrying way. Not in a way that announced collapse. It was a useful pain, almost instructional, spread through his muscles, nerves, and joints like notes left behind by the battle. His right arm still trembled a little whenever he closed his hand. His left leg felt heavy because of the cuts and the seals used during the ambush. His back burned where a blade had gone too deep, and his regeneration was still working to expel the last remnants of strange magic.

Even so, Victor smiled.

He had learned.

Not perfectly. Not even close. But enough to turn Black Lightning from an unstable ability into a usable weapon. The acceleration was still dangerous, the impacts still needed adjustment, and the offensive discharge still recoiled through his body if he mishandled the flow. But now there was logic. A path. A way to think about that energy.

Movement.

Impact.

Correction.

The rest would come with practice.

And, honestly, the Ritual had just provided enough practice for a few months.

Victor looked at the Black Ice sword in his hand. The blade was cracked in several places, but still whole. Small black sparks ran across the dark surface before disappearing between the fissures, as if the weapon itself were breathing with him. It was a strange combination. Black Ice valued stability. Black Lightning demanded flow. Alone, they were opposites. Together, they created something absurdly brutal.

The sword did not break under the impacts because it was not merely a sword.

It was blood.

It was will.

It was living structure.

Victor spun the blade once, feeling its reconstructed weight between his fingers. The movement sent a current of air slicing through the nearby leaves, not because of the blade itself, but because of the residue of acceleration still running through his arm. He watched it for a moment, then dismissed the sword. The Black Ice fragmented into dark particles and returned to his body like frozen mist.

"Right," he muttered. "That’s enough of a warm-up."

The Ascension Ritual still had not ended.

He knew that.

There was still time. There were still participants. There were still monsters. There were still people trying to survive, hunt, score points, hide, or betray one another in some corner of that artificial dimension created to turn young vampires into something their families could proudly display. It was an event, a tradition, a trial of lineage and brutality.

For Victor, however, it was already getting tiring.

He wanted to finish it.

Not because he was exhausted.

Not because he was afraid.

But because, in that moment, for the first time since he had entered that forest, a strange feeling quietly tightened in his chest.

Longing.

Victor stood still for a few seconds, staring into the empty space between the trees.

It was ridiculous.

Completely ridiculous.

He had spent years in the old timeline wishing for any kind of strength. He had died in a miserable bed, holding his mother’s hand while the entire world collapsed in silence around them. Now he was in the middle of a bloody Ritual, covered in enemy blood after massacring professional assassins, and the thought that rose in his mind was far too simple.

He wanted to go home.

He wanted to see Carmilla.

He wanted to see Scarlet.

He wanted to hear Carmilla say something arrogant, probably about how he had taken too long or how his performance was still mediocre for someone of her blood.

He wanted to see Scarlet pretending she had not been worried while inspecting every one of his wounds with that irritated, cold, and absurdly careful look.

He wanted to return to the place where chaos was familiar, where threats had known faces, where he could train until he destroyed the floor and still hear someone complaining in the background.

Victor let out a low chuckle.

"Seriously," he said to himself. "I really miss my beautiful wives."

The sentence came out without shame, but with a certain surprise.

Maybe that was what annoyed him a little.

He had grown so used to loss that any simple desire felt like a strange weakness. But it was not. At least, not anymore. Having somewhere to return to did not make him weak. On the contrary, it gave his violence a very clear direction.

If someone tried to stop that return, they would die.

Simple as that.

Victor slowly raised his face.

"Then let’s finish this Ritual."

He closed his eyes.

Until that moment, his perception had been used in a controlled way. He kept the range wide enough to detect nearby threats, but not so open that it overwhelmed his mind with useless information. It was efficient. Practical. Safe. However, now he did not want merely to survive. He wanted to find one specific person.

Jake Valentine.

If Jake was still inside the Ritual, Victor needed to find him.

Not for revenge.

Not for pride.

But because things were moving too fast. Adult assassins had entered that place carrying weapons prepared for Jake. That meant someone had planned something much larger than a simple hunt against Victor. And if there was one person capable of turning a political problem into a continental massacre out of pure irritation, it was Jake Valentine.

Victor could not let this drag on until the end of the twelve hours.

He would solve it before then.

Blood energy began to move inside him.

First slowly.

Then faster.

His heart beat once, heavy and deep, like a muffled drum beneath the earth. Then his perception opened.

It was not like before.

The red lines he was used to seeing around him did not appear.

Victor frowned slightly, eyes still closed, because for an instant he thought something had failed. Then he realized it was not failure. It was improvement. The old form of perception had vanished because it was no longer precise enough for what his body was doing.

The world lit up.

Fluorescent red points bloomed in every direction.

Not lines.

Not threads.

Points.

Every living creature within range of his perception appeared as a clear red mark, suspended in a perfectly circular mental map. Some points were small and faint, probably lesser beasts hiding among roots or caves. Others shone with greater intensity, indicating larger predators, wounded participants, or gathered groups. The distance between him and each presence appeared with frightening clarity, as if his mind calculated everything automatically.

Victor opened his eyes.

The forest before him remained dark.

But behind ordinary sight, there was something else.

A map.

Circular.

Perfect.

His range had increased absurdly.

He remained silent for a few seconds while he understood the scale. Before, his perception had already been impressive. Now, it was ridiculous. He could sense everything within a radius of more than twenty kilometers. Not as a vague impression. Not as confused traces. He could measure distance, direction, density, and movement with precision that bordered on absurd.

"Twenty kilometers... maybe a little more."

Victor looked at his own hand, then at the invisible horizon between the trees.

"This improved too."

The Primordial Blood continued to change his body.

Not just strength, regeneration, or elemental powers. His senses were evolving along with his understanding. The more he used his abilities, the more his body seemed to reorganize everything to keep up with them. As if every battle unlocked a new layer of something that had always been there, waiting for him to be brutal enough to reach it.

Victor took another deep breath and began filtering the points.

Small beasts.

Ignore.

Isolated monsters.

Ignore.

Weak participants fleeing from one another.

Ignore.

Groups too small.

Ignore.

He was searching for something specific.

Jake would not be hard to find. Even if he was hiding his aura, even if he was trying to reduce his presence, Jake Valentine was a walking anomaly. His blood would not blend into the background. It would not be mistaken for common cadets. It would not disappear the way those assassins had tried to.

Victor slowly turned his face to the left. frёewebηovel.cѳm

There was a large group in that direction.

Very large.

At least twenty-five points gathered in a relatively small area, about seventeen kilometers away. They were not scattered like people merely passing through the same location. They were organized. An outer circle, a few presences in the center, and others moving around. A defensive formation or a trap.

Victor narrowed his eyes.

"Twenty-five people... subtle."

Some of the points shone brightly.

Not as much as the adult assassins, but above the level of common participants. There were prodigies there. Maybe members of powerful families. Maybe idiots gathered to hunt someone bigger. Maybe survivors grouped together out of fear.

Then he noticed another point.

Farther away.

Stopped atop a natural rise, almost a kilometer from the group.

Alone.

Watching.

Victor recognized the flow immediately.

Grace.

He went still.

Irritation came before concern.

"She shouldn’t be there."

Grace had warned him about the hunt. She had understood part of the political movement before he had. She was clever enough to know that staying near large groups in the middle of that Ritual was asking to be used as bait, a hostage, a witness, or a symbolic corpse. And yet, there she was.

Alone.

Watching twenty-five people from a distance.

Victor ran a hand over his face, leaving a trail of partially dried blood on his skin.

"Of course. Because no one in this family knows how to simply stay away from trouble."

He looked in the direction of the group.

Jake could be there.

Or perhaps that group was looking for Jake.

Or perhaps Grace had found something she should not have.

Either way, he needed to go.

Victor lowered his body slightly.

Black Lightning ran through his legs, but this time he did not let the energy explode all at once. He breathed, kept the flow circulating, distributed the acceleration through his hips, knees, calves, and ankles. His body responded better. There was still a dangerous vibration in his muscles, but the movement no longer felt like an uncontrolled beast trying to tear its own leash apart.

"Low discharge at the start. Correction in the middle. Short release at the end."

He smiled.

"Let’s see if it works."

Victor disappeared.

The forest became a blur.

He crossed hundreds of meters in seconds, leaping between trunks, roots, and stones with a speed that would have crushed any ordinary control. Black Lightning propelled his movements in short bursts, while the Mist Steps softened his changes of direction. The combination was still imperfect, but much better than before.

When he made a mistake, he corrected it.

When he accelerated too much, he used Black Ice on his feet to create instant traction over trunks and stones.

When his body threatened to lose its axis, he distributed the discharge through his shoulders and back to reposition his posture.

It was ugly.

But it worked.

The distance decreased rapidly.

Seventeen kilometers.

Fifteen.

Twelve.

Victor kept his perception open throughout the entire path. The red points no longer trembled like the old lines. They remained sharp. He could see the group changing formation. Some were moving to the west. Two were injured. One point in the center shone with unusual intensity, but still did not seem to be Jake.

Grace remained still.

That bothered him more.

She was not running away.

She was not approaching.

She was only watching.

Victor accelerated further.

The Black Lightning discharge ran through his feet and exploded against an angled rock. The impulse launched him above the treetops for a brief instant. From above, he saw the region ahead: a wide clearing surrounded by black stones, with ancient ruins partially covered by roots. In the center, several figures were gathered. Some wore uniforms from vampiric families. Others were wounded. Some held weapons in their hands.

And on a distant rock formation, Grace was crouched, almost hidden by the shadow of a twisted tree.

Victor landed silently on a high branch, about three hundred meters from her.

For a few seconds, he only watched.

Grace did not seem injured.

But she was tense.

That already said a lot.

She held a small blade in one hand and kept the other braced against the stone, as if ready to move at any instant. Her eyes were fixed on the group below. Her expression was not one of fear, but calculation. The kind of calculation someone made when they needed to decide whether it was worth intervening or abandoning someone to die.

Victor sighed.

"You really chose a terrible place to watch the show."

Grace turned her face immediately.

Her blade rose before she recognized who had spoken.

When she saw Victor, her eyes widened slightly. Not much. Grace had too much self-control for that. But the shock was there, quick and clear, especially when she noticed his condition. Dried blood on his clothes, cuts still closing, the smell of recent death, and black sparks slowly disappearing around his arms.

She lowered the blade only a little.

"Victor?"

"No," he replied, landing calmly beside her on the rock. "I’m a very beautiful tree pretending to be your friend."

Grace stared at him for half a second.

"What an annoying guy," she said, then turned back toward the gathered crowd.

Victor moved closer to her, and they both watched.

"How long has he been standing there?" Victor asked, looking directly at Jake.

"Two hours," Grace said.

"And you stopped looking for points bec—"

"I have 1,900 points," Grace said calmly. "I don’t need to do anything else. I’m probably first."

"Damn... and here I thought I was the one hunting," he murmured.

"I killed more than forty vampires and took all their points," Grace said. "More practical than hunting monsters."

Victor let out a whistle. "Cold."