UCPA Chapter 11: The Man Who Imprisoned Himself

Chapter 11: The Man Who Imprisoned Himself

Translated by Addis of Exiled Rebels Scanlations

Editor: PlumSauce

 

Sir Kimplin’s residence was a manor house — or rather, a small, old castle. It was more like a museum than a residence. The large tracts of land and woods around the central small, old castle were private property, enclosed by electronic iron gates and tall wire fences that no one usually came near.

“I know this area,” Coraci said, sitting in his car. “I heard that there was some ancient noble family’s estate land in this area, and the property was in the name of some Frenchman who wasn’t even in this city… So I never paid attention to this place. It seems that the ancient creatures of darkness are very clever and always know some small tricks to avoid people from noticing them.”

John looked at the land and thought to himself, Why hasn’t my family accumulated any wealth yet? The vampires in the movies are all rich, and so are the owners of this manor.

The entrance of the manor house had tall, arched double doors opening into a long and spacious gallery that connected to the hall. The headless black horse disappeared like smoke, and Sir Kimplin landed on his feet and led the guests up the high steps.

Wu Jiu was reluctant to go into the other people’s houses, so he stayed in the car to wait. Before John was about to enter, the knight considerately added an extra, “Please come in.”

In fact, the knight was able to speak from the moment he stepped into his private land, but Coraci and John were sitting in the car so it was inconvenient to hold a conversation. Now Sir Kimplin could finally talk freely. He left the Clade dogs on the upper floor and took the guests directly to the basement, saying that they were free to visit the estate in the future, but now it was important to take care of business.

There was a parlor on the basement level. The furniture here was obviously bought not long ago, and its style differed from the antiques on the upper floors. The headless knight’s banshee servants brought out black tea and cookies and thoughtfully informed the guests of the wifi password here.

“My dear friend Burton lives deeper underground,” Sir Kimplin said, sitting across from the guests. “He hasn’t gone out for nearly a decade, and in the last few years he hasn’t even eaten anymore. He used to be very cheerful and enthusiastic about modern things like computers, cell phones, and other things, and he likes to follow human fashion trends. I was not good at this, so he kept teaching me. And now…he wants to slowly kill himself.”

“Suicide?” John noticed that the knight had just said that the bloodkin had stopped eating. “Does Lord Burton want to starve himself to death?”

Coraci whispered a reminder, “John, you are addressing Mr. Burton as ‘Lord’…”

“I can’t help it…”

When in close proximity to a high-blooded elder, most bloodkin become aware of them and develop a sense of psychological awe.

Two banshee servants were helping Sir Kimplin take off his armor, and the knight put his head on the couch. The head sighed and said, “To help him, I consulted a psychiatrist on the internet… That’s when my typing speed increased with practice. I also used to force him to eat. I tied him up, broke his mouth open to squeeze the blood bag in; I even once went so far as to knock him out and pour blood down his throat… But none of that worked, he was still determined to die. He cast a repulsion spell when I wasn’t paying attention to isolate the deeper underground areas. Only bloodkin can enter; all other creatures cannot.”

John and Coraci looked at each other for a moment. No wonder the Clade dogs wanted John to go home with them.

The knight’s head continued, “And all this is because Burton fell in love with Crystal, a human girl, decades ago.”

“I don’t quite understand,” John said. “Lord Burton has lived for so long that, by definition, he shouldn’t…”

The head laughed lightly and said, “I understand, you mean ‘since he’s been through enough and knows enough, he shouldn’t let something like this get to him’. But this is what happened, I cannot explain it. He met her decades ago, and she was a demon hunter.”

Coraci and John both let out a low gasp of surprise. The knight said, “I’m not sure about the details of their relationship, it’s all in the past. The point is, Burton’s never recovered since Crystal’s death.”

The knight’s head let out a long sigh and his tone became even sadder, “I know what you are thinking. You must be wondering: did the girl die a violent death? Did her death have anything to do with Burton? Is that why Burton is so sad? I tell you–no. Crystal and Burton knew each other’s identities, they helped each other, they were never hostile, and their relationship was calm and peaceful. Crystal retired in her fifties and lived a tranquil life. She developed Alzheimer’s disease in her seventies and died of a severe blood clot at eighty-two. See, the life of an ordinary person.”

Coraci put his finger to his lips in thought, and John was momentarily at a loss for what to say. John had seen many stories of vampires and humans falling in love in fiction and film. In recent years, humans really loved this subject; he remembered that even Coraci had written such stories.

Usually in the story, the human would either end up becoming a vampire or would be in danger and die. Or the one who died would be the bloodkin, betraying their clan to protect their loved one and eventually turning into ashes. Of course, there were stories where the undead watched their human lover die of old age, but these stories usually served as background. People would comment “that’s cruel” at most, almost no one wanted to know what that experience was really like.

“Burton once told me,” the knight continued, “he said that he was mentally prepared; he would go to take care of the elderly huntress, and calmly send her off when she passed away. However, he thought too simply. It is not as simple as watching her grow more wrinkles and gray hair. He watched as she lost most of her eyesight, lost her memory, lost her ability to care for herself, and had various complications all over her body… She no longer recognized her family or Burton. Sometimes she was like a child, sometimes like an irritable animal… When she died, the scene was not warm like in the movies. I can only say that, in fact, every detail was very cruel. In the past, Burton has seen a lot of fleeting passers-by, experienced love and witnessed death, but … He was ingrained so deeply with someone’s life, and finally sent her away; for him it was the first time.”

It was painful enough to watch a loved one die — but even more painful to watch that person lie tortured in a hospital bed for years, gradually changing beyond recognition before finally passing.

John asked, “So, why didn’t Lord Burton give her…”

“You mean, the First Embrace?” The knight laughed again while his body waved his hand. “No, that’s not possible. Burton won’t convert her, that was agreed upon when the two of them fought side by side. Because Crystal has faith. You can understand, right?”

At this point Coraci spoke up, “So, Sir, what can we do to help you?”

Sir Kimplin replied, “As I said earlier, Burton sealed off the room below and imprisoned himself so that only bloodkin could get close to him. I need this Mr. Bloodkin to go down to him for me.”

“But what can I do?” John was puzzled. He didn’t think he was very good at being a psychological counselor. “I’m not very good at advising people, let alone fellow clansmen, and he’s lived more years than I have…”

Coraci interrupted him, “John, you misunderstand. Do you think we’re responsible for getting Mr. Burton back in a good mood?”

“No? Then what is it?” John felt Coraci exchange glances with the head of the headless knight, although the eyes on that head were long gone.

Coraci said, “John, you are also bloodkin. A bloodkin who has not eaten for years, what kind of state would he be in? He wants a slow death, but he can’t get it.”

At this point, John finally understood.”I get it! At this rate, instinct will overcome his intellect…”

“That’s it. Mr. Burton is very determined, but perhaps one day he will lose his self-control. The more weakened he is, the more dangerous he becomes.”

The knight took over and said, “Young Mr. Bloodkin, the immediate task now is to force him to eat. And this is something only you can do.”

Coraci busied himself with reporting the matter to the Association for the record and returned to the car to find something. The knight, meanwhile, directed the banshees to bring in small coolers with blood bags.

John stood in front of the door to the lower basement and looked down the dark tunnel with great unease. He was about to face a much older kinsman and to force feed the other. He was not worried that he could not beat Burton — the vampire would be extremely weak after such a long starvation — but he was a little worried that after eating, Burton would have the strength to beat him… As he was thinking, the headless knight tapped him on the shoulder and handed him a pair of insulated gloves.

“These are…?” He was about to ask, when Coraci, who had gone to the car to get something, came back. Coraci was holding two sets of silver shackles that were engraved with dense runes.

John then realized that they were also worried that Burton would beat him up after he was full.

Before John was ready to go down, the knight solemnly told him, “If Burton resists, you can use any means to suppress him, as long as he can survive.”

A strange feeling came over him. John suddenly sensed Sir Kimplin’s mood.

Burton, who collapsed after witnessing Crystal’s slow death, wanted to let himself die slowly like that, but he must not have thought that he was torturing Kimplin with the same pain. Apparently Sir Kimplin did not want Burton to die, much less watch him torment himself. Perhaps Burton never realized this, never realized the cruelty of his own actions.

After walking slowly down the stairs, the lights on the first floor faded away, and in the darkness, the deep red color unique to bloodkins slowly appeared in John’s eyes.

In the silence, John suddenly wondered, If he and Coraci became long-term working partners, then wouldn’t he, in the future someday, also need to watch Coraci slowly die?

He shook his head and continued walking, deciding not to think about the far future.

 

From The Unthreatening Creature Protection Association’s Guide to Unscientific Monsters:

Banshees

Although traditionally called “female spirits”, banshees are not necessarily female. In ancient times, women were often stigmatized, so these eerie, chilling entities were labeled as “female.”

A more accurate term is simply banshee.

(Note: In folklore, banshees are often depicted as female spirits, but that is not the case here.)

Origin: Banshees are dark creatures with complex origins. They usually arise in one of two ways:

1. From lingering traces of energy left by undead activity, human spellcraft, or other magical residues.
2. From souls harvested by a headless knight. Researchers believe that the soul-harvesting ability of these knights contains a power that, by coincidence, is the same force that naturally gives rise to banshees, which is why there are two origin paths.

Behavior:

Banshees prefer to follow more powerful undead, particularly the Oath of Vengeance type (described earlier). Naturally-formed, free banshees cluster around these powerful beings, while those formed from a Doomcaliber knight’s soul-harvesting are bound to the knight’s weapon — or nearby objects, not necessarily the weapon itself.

Transformation:

When a soul is harvested by a headless knight, it is impaled on the knight’s weapon and tortured by cold iron and raging flame. This torment ends only when the soul transforms into a banshee. The stronger the original being, the longer the process; ordinary humans typically take only a few months.

Like Oath of Vengeance entities, ghosts, and spirits, banshees are immortal and require no sustenance.

Banshees possess a fear-inducing ability that can paralyze the living. Unlike ghosts, during the day, banshees cannot leave the shadows but have corporeal form. At night, they can freely move, shifting between corporeal and incorporeal states.

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Author’s Note:

John is actually a little different from other monsters. He has a family — his parents and a younger sister they adopted more than thirty years ago — so he isn’t truly alone. Even when he drifts through the city by himself, he still has loved ones; it’s the modern age, after all — phones and all that.

Because of this, he really hasn’t had much entanglement with ordinary humans before…

As for the main couple’s lifespan issue, I’ll resolve that without using transformation. Like I mentioned before…Coraci isn’t exactly an ordinary human either, even though physiologically, he is human.

 

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