Chapter 34: Details and Illusions
Translated by Addis of Exiled Rebels Scanlations
Editor: PlumSauce
The Bunker was heavily guarded but rather simple. There were no doctors here because the “prisoners” rarely got sick. Even if someone got injured in a fight, the guards were all hunters by trade, and they were perfectly capable of treating wounds.
When a prisoner did fall ill, the only one who could act as a doctor was Warden Russell. The Demon Hunter Society severely lacked spellcasters. The young men were skilled with guns and hand-to-hand combat but knew little about potions or magic.
After Coraci had examined the “girl’s” wings, he went to prepare the poultices and had to combine them with some human anti-inflammatory medicine. He worked all night, running back and forth between the guard office and the cell block. Meanwhile, John was taken on patrol by Volvo to learn the secrets of management. He hadn’t seen Coraci all night.
Before lights-out, John, like any ordinary guard, checked the prisoners in his assigned area one by one to see if they were in bed. In front of a solitary cell, he finally found Coraci.
Coraci was speaking quietly with the blonde girl, whispering instructions. The girl lowered her head, and the pair of white feathered wings on her back trembled faintly.
John was stunned. This prisoner was actually an angel! Her gaze was somewhat vacant, and her body pressed almost against the bars, as if desperate to be closer to Coraci. When Coraci tried to walk away, she called out to him.
“Wait… This is for you.”
She bent down and picked up a feather from the floor, still keeping her head bowed, shy and gentle. Coraci smiled at her and took the white feather. Under the dim yellow light, it glowed with a warm hue.
“Thank you,” Coraci said, slipping the feather into his shirt pocket. He gently squeezed the girl’s slender hand. “It’s precious. I’ll keep it safe.”
As Coraci neared the corner of the hallway, John stepped forward from the shadows.
“John?” Coraci let out a breath. “You scared me. The lighting’s pretty dim here.”
John glanced back. The blonde girl was still looking over at them through the bars.
“She is a… what?”
“A mothman.”
“You shouldn’t be so kind to prisoners,” John blurted.
He immediately regretted it. His tone sounded like a jealous little girl whose mom bought her sister a new dress.
Obviously, Coraci didn’t understand why John suddenly said that either.
“She’s sick,” Coraci said. “Mr. Russell diagnosed her before, but he’s allergic. Just being near her makes him uncomfortable…”
“Sorry, uh, I mean, I’m worried these prisoners could be dangerous,” John explained. “Volvo and I checked some cells earlier and found two guys fighting in the laundry room… These creatures are really dangerous. You’re so close to her; I’m afraid she might attack you.”
“Then why didn’t you just come over directly instead of hiding here watching?” Coraci asked with a smile.
John’s mouth parted slightly, his eyes darting around. Even he didn’t know the answer.
Coraci patted his shoulder. “Come on, our posts aren’t here.”
Near midnight, a closed transport vehicle pulled into the parking lot. Four demon hunters escorted a new prisoner through the Bunker’s many gates and handed him over to the guards.
The prisoner named Driftwood wore a burlap sack over his head. His figure was ordinary — not the type who seemed especially dangerous. During the search of his belongings, Warden Russell came personally to see him.
Russell yanked the sack from his head. Driftwood was still young, in his early twenties. Apart from his skin being somewhat sunburned, he looked like any other ordinary young man. The only thing striking was his eyes — tired, yet carrying a faint madness.
“I’m the warden of the Bunker…” Russell leaned on the table’s edge. The guards nearby exchanged looks. They all felt the warden could collapse at any moment. “If possible, none of us want to imprison a hunter…cough, cough!” He coughed repeatedly as he spoke. “But this is the Society’s rule. Without rules, nothing works… Ah! Blood!”
Russell took a few weak steps backward, swaying. Two guards by his side quickly steadied him.
He looked at the blood on his handkerchief and sank slowly to the floor.
“Warden Russell, you have a nosebleed,” one guard reminded him. Russell touched his nose and confirmed it. He felt somewhat reassured and tried to straighten up.
Driftwood looked at him calmly, like an extremely polite soldier who wouldn’t interrupt a superior’s speech.
“Continuing where we left off,” Russell said, tilting his head back as a guard pressed an ice pack against his nose. “Mr. Driftwood, you already know there are monsters who hate you all over the world. The prisoners here are relatively well-behaved, and we will take care of you within reasonable limits, so you have nothing to worry about. However, if you start any disputes, we will not — cough, cough, cough! — tolerate or indulge you…”
“Yes, sir,” Driftwood said softly. His voice was a little hoarse, filled with the same exhaustion as his eyes.
“I’m going to cast a few spells on you now. This is a necessary check. Please try to relax,” Russell said. He called for a guard to support him as he moved closer and pulled a vial of scented oil from his pocket.
“Ah, my finger hurts so much…” the frail warden trembled. “I really need to go to the hospital when I get a break. What if it’s rheumatism?”
“Warden Russell, what’s wrong?” a guard asked.
The warden sighed. “Send for Deville Coraci. My finger’s cold and aching again. He’ll have to help.”
When the guard came to fetch him, Coraci, John, and Volvo crouched on the floor. The werewolf Volvo was teaching them how to play a board game called Werewolf — and during work hours, no less.
They were just about to leave when excited shouts echoed from deep within the cell block.
“Is Driftwood here? I can’t wait to see him! He must want to see me too!”
“That’s Hayden. Ignore him,” the Guard Captain said in a lowered voice.
The werewolf Hayden kept shouting Driftwood’s name, spitting out a string of vulgar words until other guards finally lost patience and knocked on the bars to silence him.
Driftwood didn’t resist the spells. He even politely thanked Russell and Coraci. All the while, he kept his gaze locked on John and Volvo.
John and Volvo were the only two non-humans in the room — a vampire and a werewolf. Everyone could see the deep hostility burning in Driftwood’s eyes.
Driftwood was reputed to be an excellent demon hunter, but he harbored an excessive hatred and violent impulse toward dark creatures. He struggled to cooperate with others, often disregarding the safety of partners or innocents. Eventually, his reckless behavior caused major damage.
Volvo nudged John’s side and whispered, “I heard this hunter’s last case involved a vampire. Be careful — I think he might pick a fight with you.”
“I thought it was usually the guards picking fights with prisoners?” John countered.
“Maybe. But you’re a fragile vampire, and your partner’s an even more vulnerable human spellcaster. You two can’t handle a guy like him. But with me here, you’re safe.”
John wanted to ask again, What do you really think about vampires… but held back. Volvo’s enthusiasm and the self-confidence of the other guards were genuine. They might be a bit arrogant but not malicious. John had seen this kind of proud protectiveness before, like when off-duty cops stepped in to help regular people in trouble.
There was a more personal example — John himself felt something like that toward Coraci. He didn’t want Coraci exposed too much to the monstrous prisoners for fear of injury, even though Coraci had plenty of experience dealing with monsters.
Driftwood was escorted to another section outside Guard Captain Volvo’s jurisdiction. They deliberately avoided letting Driftwood and Hayden cross paths.
But the guards all knew those two would inevitably meet sooner or later — during work hours (which mostly involved washing their own clothes or helping in the kitchen and were fairly easy tasks), free time (gilomorphs were put in special crates and carried outside by guards), or the two daily meal times. Except for breakfast — breakfast was packaged bread delivered straight to cells.
Fights rarely ended in prisoner deaths in the monster prison because if that happened, the culprit was often executed immediately. The monsters in the cells generally knew how to avoid dangerous behavior.
Still, they could torment each other. Monsters knew their limits. Prisoners like Hayden, who held a certain status inside, were even better at avoiding risk.
John’s shift ended two hours later than Coraci’s. When he returned to the dormitory, Coraci was already asleep.
Because the Bunker lay deep underground, the rooms had no windows. Once the lights went out, it was completely pitch black. Humans needed darkness to sleep but usually disliked total absence of any light. The bathroom light stayed on with a slight door crack, letting a thin beam spill onto the floor near Coraci’s feet.
He’s sleeping way too deeply, and the door’s not even closed. What if it wasn’t me who came in? John thought, stepping inside to close the door properly.
The mothman’s feather was tucked inside a book, used as a bookmark. John quietly picked up the book and flipped to the page with the feather. Bloodkin eyes could read just fine in the dark.
It was a directory Coraci had borrowed from Mr. Russell, listing most of the creatures imprisoned in the Bunker. The descriptions weren’t detailed — just basic concepts.
Elven sorcerers, werewolves, vampires, satyrs, mortal-born demons, shapeshifters… The feather marked the mothman’s page. Most of the descriptions were over John’s head, but he could tell it was a species dangerous in both juvenile and adult stages. Even if they meant no harm, they could injure humans. Only elderly mothmen were harmless, their personalities stable and no longer frightening in appearance.
Maybe that angel-like girl was… elderly? John chuckled quietly. No matter how he looked, she didn’t seem like an old person.
John skimmed through the directory, then pulled out his phone. There was no signal down here; the nighttime recreation room was locked up, and he couldn’t get any network access.
Although bloodkin could enter a kind of rest when fatigued, they didn’t need the regular sleep cycles humans did. Now, unable to sleep and with nothing to do, John just sat on the edge of his bed, staring blankly at Coraci across the room.
Coraci’s body rose and fell evenly in deep sleep. Sitting in the dark, John took a blood bag from the cooler and sipped slowly, his thoughts wandering back to how he used to think as a human.
Putting himself in a human’s shoes, he came to a startling conclusion — Coraci was sleeping so soundly in an underground facility full of monsters, right there in front of a vampire. It was incredible.
John imagined himself locked in a dungeon filled with countless Carolyns, sharing a room with Mr. Driftwood. Forget sleeping; he wouldn’t dare to even blink.
But Coraci had even volunteered to let him feed and could sleep so defenselessly… John absentmindedly touched his lips.
That was a profound trust. John was certain that even his own mother and father had never won human trust to that extent — except, perhaps, between themselves a hundred years ago.
He set the blood bag down and toyed with the feather in his hand, idly flipping through the monster directory. I’m like these creatures — something beyond human, he thought. Suddenly, an unnamed bitterness crept into his chest.
Coraci was his superior, partner, even a mentor and friend. But what was he in Coraci’s eyes? Partner, no doubt. But beyond that?
In the dark, John’s thoughts drifted. To Coraci, was he John Lockland, or just a colleague who happened to be saved? Like the monsters listed here — targets the organization would help?
He slipped the feather back into the book and placed it on Coraci’s bedside table.
For the first time, John found the night unbearably dull and long. He just sat there, dazed, unable to understand why he felt so melodramatic, like a human teenager in the dark.
The next day, Coraci woke earlier than John. It was nearly noon, actually — their shifts ran from afternoon into evening. John had slept like a corpse — perfectly straight. In fact, his resting state really was like that of a corpse. Coraci secretly snapped a few photos from different angles.
When John woke, the blanket covered his face. He could hear Coraci pacing.
“Uh… good morning,” John said, pulling back the blanket. He didn’t remember when he’d fallen asleep and felt a strange illusion of living with Coraci.
“Good afternoon. Is it too bright? I was hoping you’d rest a little longer.” Coraci was brushing his teeth.
“I don’t wake up from the light. You don’t have to cover my face…” Covered up, he looked even more like a corpse. John sat up and noticed his shoes had been taken off.
He was about to ask when Coraci said, “I know bloodkin don’t need regular sleep, and you don’t need pajamas or blankets, but…sleeping with shoes on looks weird. I didn’t want to say anything, but it was just too awkward…”
“I used to take my shoes off at home,” John said, lowering his head and scratching it sheepishly. “I mean at my parents’ place. My mother cared a lot about lifestyle quality — she insisted we change into pajamas.”
Coraci spit out the mouthwash and quickly returned to the living room. Standing solemnly in front of John, who was tying his shoelaces, he said seriously, “John, I want to discuss something with you.”
“What’s up?” John paused his movements.
Coraci looked embarrassed and lowered his head. “Uh, since you’re bloodkin, I basically have the washroom to myself, unless you go wash your face or something…”
“Yeah? What about it?”
“Would you mind going to the recreation room first? Maybe play some board games with Volvo, or use the internet there.”
“Volvo’s people all work late shifts. I don’t know if he’s up yet… What’s going on?”
“I want to use the washroom,” Coraci said politely. “You know, I hate small enclosed spaces. Public washrooms aren’t this cramped, so they’re fine for me, but this one…”
Coraci blushed slightly but pressed on. “I never close the door at home, but right now, I’m a bit…”
John quickly finished tying his shoes and stood up. “Okay, I’ll go wash my face, then head straight to the rec room. You can come find me afterward. See you later.”
After leaving the room, John kept marveling at how incredible people were. Before interviewing Coraci, he’d thought the author was stern and serious. Instead, the man was gentle and talkative. Now John recalled a common saying: If you never live with someone, you’ll never see their true self.
John had almost said, “I don’t mind, you go ahead,” but he knew Coraci would mind.
“Got something good to smile about?” The Guard Captain’s voice came from the front of the hall. “Why are you grinning while you walk?”
“Am I?” John immediately tried to control his expression.
“Where’s your partner?”
“Still resting,” John answered distractedly.
“Oh, no wonder. He’s a bit weak — probably exhausted from last night. What time did you guys finish?”1
“What? No! No way!” John turned in surprise.
Volvo was even more shocked. “Why do you look like a Chihuahua? Nothing to freak out about. You know, your partner helped Warden Russell a lot after work yesterday, so it’s normal if he’s tired… And the people from the next shift were a little late — lazy bums. I mean, what time did you two get off work?”
John awkwardly responded, silently ashamed of his wandering thoughts again.
The prisoners’ free activity area was a sunken oval plaza. A high dome overhead was protected by magical runes, and guards patrolled the raised perimeter around the plaza.
It was a bit like an indoor gymnasium, except the audience seats were guard posts — and there were far fewer seats.
John watched his assigned prisoners alongside other guards when Volvo patted his shoulder. “Look over there. They’re coming.”
Coraci helped the white-winged girl through a small gate beside the plaza.
“They really do look like they’re dancing at a ball…” John murmured.
“What? Dancing?” Volvo gave him a puzzled look. “Do vampires dance like that? Is that some kind of custom of yours?”
He gestured to a spot a few steps away from Coraci — the werewolf Hayden and three lackeys swaggered past the other prisoners, basking in their awe.
“You were saying I should watch Hayden?” John finally caught on.
“What else?”
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