Adam forced himself to endure the discomfort as he stepped into the district, carefully picking his way through the muck.
Although the entire area was a mass of piled excrement, there was a marked difference between the dry and the wet patches.
Once he entered the slums, tracking became increasingly difficult. The stench was overwhelming, and Adam felt as though his nose might fail him if he continued to try and follow even the faintest traces of the potion's scent.
Fortunately, Adam was not entirely without clues. He had already memorized some of the features of the person he was tracking, especially those observed during the hand-washing ritual.
People in this era believed water to be unclean, rarely washing their hands or drinking water. Those with means would drink wine, while the less fortunate settled for beer or various broths.
This belief had multiple origins, one of the primary reasons being public health concerns.
Most water in the area, except for a few wells, was of poor quality, and the people had never developed the habit of boiling water before drinking it. Consuming untreated water often led to serious illness.
Once the belief that water was unclean had taken hold, most people no longer even bothered to wash their hands. As a result, it was rare to see anyone with clean hands.
Adam's habit of frequently cleaning himself, though not commented on by the Boku family, was regarded as a strange quirk.
"I guess I'm still not ruthless enough," Adam muttered to himself with self-deprecating humor. True ruthlessness wasn't just about being hard on others; it also required being harsh on oneself.
He could pretend to eat the holy bread without a hint of discomfort, enduring the pain so as not to expose himself in front of the head monk, but he still couldn't bear the thought of being covered in filth, smelling unbearably foul.
Meanwhile, the monks at the church remained impeccably clean, as they used holy water.
Holy water came in different types. The simplest kind was drawn from the well beneath the church bell tower, where the church's bell—one of the few items related to the supernatural—was believed to imbue the water with a faint divine power.
The water used by the faithful for purification rituals, like washing hands before prayer, was this type of holy water.
As the otherworldly devotee washed his hands, Adam noticed something peculiar—a wooden splinter and some wood shavings caught beneath his nails. The splinter appeared fresh, not like something that would come from casual contact with wood.
Generally, anyone with such wood fragments under their nails would either be a carpenter or a lumberjack.
Adam leaned toward the latter theory, especially considering the dirt on the edges of the man's shoes, which was speckled with moss. Of course, this was all conjecture.
As he walked, Adam couldn't allow himself to fully unleash his heightened senses. He cautiously made his way through the slums toward the edge of the forest, circling quietly for a while before finally picking up a new lead.
It wasn't a scent, but a sound.
In the quiet of the night, Adam heard noises emanating from a secluded wooden cabin near the forest. It sounded like a beast, one trying to howl in madness but suppressing itself, its fear forcing it to stifle its voice into low growls.
As Adam extended his perception, the being inside seemed like a powder keg ready to explode. The closer he got, the more distinct the low murmurs became.
"Blood… blood…" The word sent a frown across Adam's face. To his knowledge, werewolves did not have any particular craving for blood, unlike vampires, who were notorious for their bloodlust.
A true vampire was created through a sorcerer's research into werewolves, using a ritual that transformed them into a new form. Each creation of a pure vampire required the sacrifice of a werewolf, which explained the inherent animosity between the two species.
Yet, Adam could tell that the creature in the cabin was far from a pure vampire.
Some werewolves could spread lycanthropy through bites, turning normal humans into non-pure werewolves, and similarly, vampires created through werewolf transformation had a similar ability to convert humans into non-pure vampires, often called blood slaves.
This being was a vampire, but the real question was how it had become a blood slave.
"Could it be that a pure vampire once appeared in Roya? Or did this one get transformed elsewhere and then flee here?" Adam pondered the possibilities.
Unlike the typical tales of vampires, Adam didn't automatically seek to destroy the creature. He understood there was no personal gain in such an action, and he generally refrained from doing things that brought no benefit.
However, he couldn't ignore the potential threat posed by a true vampire still residing in Roya.
A true vampire would be a sorcerer, likely one with deep knowledge of werewolves. Adam had no reason to hate vampires without cause, but he couldn't be certain that a vampire wouldn't decide, on a whim, to capture him for experimentation.
"The situation in Roya is growing more complicated," Adam thought, frowning. But despite this, he decided to continue with his plan.
He approached the cabin silently, though he did not intend to enter. Instead, he entered a heightened state of perception, starting to scan everything around him.
Inside, the blood slave was caught in an overwhelming desire for blood. That primal instinct for feeding could only be suppressed by another, stronger instinct: the will to survive.
As Adam had guessed, the man—Adel—had been shattered by fear. After the witch doctor's capture and the subsequent public execution, Adel had fallen into a deep terror.
In his fear, he had even made some foolish decisions.
Adam didn't disturb the blood slave's condition but instead moved silently to the side of the house, using his claws to pry open the cellar's lock.
Covering his mouth and nose, Adam descended into the cellar. Though his werewolf form provided him with excellent low-light vision, the cellar was too dark to make out any details. Following the faint scent of oil lamps, he lit one and illuminated the entire cellar.
Though he had expected this, Adam still felt a faint unease at the gruesome sight before him.
The cellar was supported by wooden beams, with some cabinets containing bottles—some empty, others still partially filled.
As anticipated, the bottles contained magical potions.
However, it wasn't the potions that caught Adam's attention, but rather the twisted, decaying corpse that lay before him.
The chains and ropes, the marks on the posts, and the feces piled in the corners—all pointed to what had transpired here.
Though vampires and blood slaves did not have the same lunacy induced by the moon as werewolves, they shared their own affliction: an unnatural, insatiable thirst for blood.
In Roya, even in the slums, frequent attacks involving blood-draining would draw the attention of the church's monks. On the other hand, a single missing person might go unnoticed, as disappearances were far too common in the slums.
Keeping someone locked in a cellar as a steady source of blood was not surprising for a cautious blood slave.
"Was his anger so uncontrollable, driven by fear?" Adam thought, paying his respects to the dead man. The twisted corpse before him bore witness to the unimaginable suffering the man had endured, even in death.
"Had he lost his mind before he died?" Adam noted the scratches on the wooden pillar, which had originally recorded something but were now only chaotic bite marks. It was clear that the prisoner had gone mad before his death.
It was a mistake to romanticize vampires. At their core, they were still otherworldly beings, sometimes more beastly than werewolves, and the blood slaves they infected were even worse.
Adam didn't try to hide his disgust for the blood slave. He was well aware that he was a scoundrel, but this blood slave was something far worse—nothing more than refuse.
"I am indeed a scoundrel," Adam thought, fully acknowledging his nature.
He didn't turn to end the life of the human garbage but instead knocked on a nearby wooden cabinet. After a few moments, he retrieved a book from a hidden compartment.
Flipping through the pages briefly, Adam tucked it away, unsheathing his claws and beginning to write on the cabinet.
Once he had finished writing the note he had prepared earlier, Adam hesitated for a moment before adding a final line: Bury the body quickly, I'm sure you don't want to bring the stench of death into the church, only to have the monks notice.
With that, Adam extinguished the oil lamp, grabbed the book, and left the slums with haste.
Reaching a clean riverbank, Adam set the book down on the shore, then dove into the water to cleanse himself. The stench from the blood slave made him feel repulsed.
Gazing up at the crescent moon high above, Adam resisted the urge to howl in frustration. He picked up the book, then vanished into the night.