I say that, but in the end I didn't do that much. For most of the three-month summer vacation, I had returned to Jing Tian City and spent time with my dad. Adrian and Melina came over to visit – particularly Adrian – and they did receive a few training sessions in Dad's dojo. Obviously Melina couldn't spend too much time in Jing Tian City, so she was only here for a few weeks.

Then everything was over, and I had to return to Flandor City to resume my exchange program. On the train, I read up on the destruction of Grimaldus with some form of satisfaction.

"Serves them right," I muttered under my breath and scrolled down the screen of my smartphone. There wasn't much for me to do except read, so I took out my Kindle and began reading for fun. I wanted to return to the forty-first millennium, where humanity reigned a.s.s the dominant force in the galaxy, battling heretics, xenos and daemons from the warp.

Then the train suddenly rolled to a stop. The lights flickered, causing me to glance up. I frowned and glanced about, noticing that the only other pa.s.sengers in the carriage was a middle-aged salaryman and a girl in a high school sailor uniform, her long hair tied into braids. In the dim moments when the lights alternate between on and off, I could have sworn I saw her eyes glow red in the dark.

"What's going on?" I murmured with a frown, my hands automatically reaching for my two swords. The high school girl in a dark blue sailor uniform was also carrying a sword, which was not all that unusual, given that we were all combat mages training in magic academies. I didn't recognize her uniform or school badge, but she was clearly one of them.

As was I.

However, when the train came to a sudden halt, she was up on her feet. The middle-aged salaryman twitched, and he suddenly scrambled off his seat and broke into a run.

"…huh?"

For a moment, I was confused, until I saw the girl chase after him. She was drawing her katana from the black scabbard and pursuing the panicked salaryman.

"What the h.e.l.l?"

I was on my feet too, and moving toward them. I wasn't sure what I intended to do. Stop the high school girl in sailor uniform from killing the guy, perhaps. Obviously I couldn't sit by and watch as someone got murdered in cold blood right in front of my eyes.

I was supposed to be a hero, after all.

"Wait…!" I called out, even though I was aware that the girl wouldn't respond. The middle-aged man sent me a terrified gaze, his eyes gleaming in the darkness in between moments of alternate light and darkness.

"Save me!" he cried, desperately fumbling for the next train carriage. He ran into the doors and scrabbled at the latch, trying to yank it open. The girl was upon him right now, her sword flas.h.i.+ng down on him. His eyes darted toward me. "Help! She's crazy!"

I was about to do so when I noticed something wrong. When the darkness came again, my lenses kicked in and scanned the guy, and I saw something seriously wrong. There was a monstrous shadow cast by the seemingly human figure, bearing partial wings, claws and fangs.

"You are…"

Even though I stopped in my tracks, the girl showed no such hesitation and slashed the guy. Blood fountained out and the salaryman shrieked one final time before crumpling to the floor.

The girl than flicked the blood off her katana and sheathed it. She narrowed her eyes at me, turned away and retrieved her smartphone.

"Mission accomplished." She then paused. "There is a witness. I'll leave him to you guys to deal with." Then she shrugged. "I couldn't help it. Also, he seems to know that the target wasn't human. But if you want me to silence him, I'll cut him down."

Adjusting my gla.s.ses, I placed a hand on the hilt of one of my swords and watched her cautiously. She scowled.

"He'll be a troublesome opponent. I'm not sure I'll be able to cut him down." There was a voice at the other end of her smartphone and she sighed in exaggerated exasperation. "I know, I know. I won't do anything, okay? You guys deal with him."

Whoom.

The train moved again. The lights flickered back on and stayed on this time, illuminating the carriage.

The girl glared at me as she hung up and placed her smartphone back in her pocket.

"Don't ask me any questions," she said coldly. "I won't be answering them."

"I didn't say anything, though?!"

The girl ignored me and went back to sit down. I watched her, and then decided to drop down on the train seat as well. There was no point standing around like an idiot. Glancing to the train door, I stared at the man's corpse. Blood was pooling underneath, turning into a red lake. My gla.s.ses whirred and scanned the body, and I caught sight of data informing that he was not human.

The train finally came to a stop, but this time it was at a station. The train driver spoke the name of the station overhead, but his voice was drowned out as pa.s.sengers stomped out of the other carriages. In the almost empty carriage, the girl stood up and disembarked from the train.

Not wanting to be left inside the carriage, alone with the seemingly human corpse, I also rose to my feet. Not to mention, I overheard the train driver announcing that this was the last stop, and the train would terminate here. So there was little point in sticking around.

A couple of men in suit hurried over, both of them large and burly. One was a blind Caucasian with a large nose, while the other was a black with curly hair. They regarded me curiously, but focused their attention on the girl.

"Saya!" the Caucasian called to the girl as he approached her. "Are you all right?"

"Of course. I told you that I accomplished the mission, didn't I?" she then raised her katana. "And get me a new blade. This one is getting worn out. I had trouble slicing through the target."

"I see." The blond man nodded. "I'll arrange for a new sword to be sent to you. It'll take a week or so."

"I don't have a week, David." The girl called Saya shoved him a little as she stepped around him. "Make it three days."

"Saya…" David sounded as if he was trying to placate her, even though he looked about twice her age. "You know swords don't just grow on trees. We need to get it forged and manufactured…"

While the two of them argued, the black man moved into the carriage to take a good look at the "target." He blanched and almost jumped back out.

"What the h.e.l.l?! That's a human in there! What's going on?!"

"Shut up, Jason!" David snapped at him.

"But…" Jason protested, gesticulating frantically back toward the carriage. "No matter how you look at him, he's just a man! If you don't believe me, take a look!"

Saya merely gave him a glare before stalking off. Jason stepped toward her in rage, waving at her.

"Wait! Hey, you! Get back here! We're not done yet!"

But David struck him before he could say anything else. Hauling Jason up by his collar, he slammed the poor dude against the train.

"Shut up, you idiot! You want to die or something?!"

"What do you mean?!" Jason was coughing, but he glared at his fellow suited dude defiantly.

"She's the only one who can identify them. Of course they look human – they are shapes.h.i.+fters! Once they take human form, there's almost no way for us to tell them apart! That's why we have her hunt them!"

"If I may…" I raised a hand and pointed toward the corpse in the train. "The guy's not human. I'm picking up strange biological signals that do not belong to a human."

"Right. The other way is through devices and stuff." David let go of Jason and turned to me, studying my gla.s.ses. He must have caught sight of the holographic signals on my gla.s.ses, which were still churning out readings and data. "That's quite the hi-tech gla.s.ses you have."

"What do we do about him?" Jason was smoothing out his suit and trying to recover. He reached for his gun and pointed it at me. "Do we silence him?"

"Idiot!"

David was too late. Jason screamed as his arm flew up into the air, blood spurting from his stump. Dropping to his knees, he stared at me, terrified. My black blade was pressed against his throat, drawing a thin line of blood.

"W…wait! I'm sorry! Please…we can talk this through! There doesn't need to be any killing!"

"That's not what your friend said."

"It's…it's just a misunderstanding!" David glared at the howling Jason. "Hurry up and apologize, you dolt! Do you want to lose your head?"

"Sorry…" the guy in the suit whimpered, clutching his stump and staring at me, tears streaming down his eyes. "I…I didn't mean to…"

I glared at him, then withdrew my sword. I never intended to kill Jason, but he asked for it by pulling a gun on me. While I was generally a nice guy, I wasn't stupid enough to let people point a gun at me and shoot. I had enough of idiots targeting me because they were enemies with Dad. Not that Jason needed to know that, of course, but at least he was aware that his life wouldn't be taken anytime soon. The guy dropped back onto his rump, immensely relieved.

"However…" David began, and then raised both of his hands when I turned to him. "Don't misunderstand! I'm just requesting that you keep this a secret! If the public knows that there are shapes.h.i.+fting monsters roaming amongst them, there will be a ma.s.s panic!"

"Sure." I lowered my sword and sheathed it. "It's not as if anyone will believe me anyway."

"What's going on?" To my surprise, a newcomer showed up. It wasn't Saya, who had disappeared long ago, but rather Kufa Van Peer. He stopped and stared at me, surprised. "Cla.s.smate Richard? What are you doing here?"

"Oh? You know each other?" David was looking relieved as he wiped cold perspiration from his face. "This young man is a witness. He saw Saya cutting down a Chiropteran in the train…"

"A what?" I interrupted. David hesitated, but Kufa stepped forward.

"It's all right. I know him. He's a fellow combat mage who is currently enrolled in my school for an exchange program."

David nodded, and turned back to me. "That's what we call the shapes.h.i.+fting monsters. They have inherited the genes of a bat, and feed on human blood. That's why we hunt them down, to ensure n.o.body falls victim to their predations."

"Heh…so vampires?" I asked. David winced.

"Not exactly."

"Don't even begin to put them in the same cla.s.sification as vampires," Kufa told me seriously. "Vampires are still humans. They are mages who excel in blood magic, and delve into forbidden lore to increase their powers. These things aren't human. They're…an offshoot, a mutation. Monsters that feed on human blood and then shapes.h.i.+ft into the species of their victims. It's to camouflage themselves."

I grimaced. "That's scary."

"Anyway, I'll take him with me." Kufa was addressing David and Jason. "You guys take care of the aftermath. I'll brief him on what's happening."

"Recruit him if possible." David gestured toward my gla.s.ses. "He has some hi-tech gear that can tell apart the Chiropterans from humans."

"Oh, right. That would be a great help." Kufa grinned. "But that's not the only thing I need his help for."

"What do you mean?" I frowned. Kufa put an arm around my shoulders and began leading me away from the train.

"You're heading back to school, right? Perfect. There are a few things I'll need your help with, if you don't mind…"

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