Chapter 388: Vampire Survivors (Part. III)
"Call my husband an idiot again, and I'll kill you all with a single strike."
Katharina's voice came out low, guttural, reverberating with an unnatural echo that did not belong to this world. Her eyes became two scarlet slits, and her veins glowed with demonic energy, as if Hell itself pulsed beneath her skin. Behind her, wings of darkness and fire briefly appeared—not physical, but a spiritual manifestation that left everyone frozen for an instant.
The floor cracked beneath her feet.
The aura that spread through the Crimson Chapel was not just violent. It was terrifying, hellish, as if a General of the First Fall had descended from the Abyss and taken form.
All the vampires present — even the elders — instinctively stepped back. Some swallowed hard. Others already had their hands on their weapons, growling or retreating. One of the elders began to chant a protective spell, but stopped when he realized he was shaking too much to complete the words.
Kaguya did not move. She just watched, silently. It was as if she had expected this. As if she had allowed it.
Viper, even suffocated, had the strength to smile—or perhaps it was a spasm of madness. Her eyes, one normal and the other obsidian, fixed on Katharina with something close to... respect?
"So... he's someone..." Viper hissed, kneeling on the cracked marble, the skin on her neck still steaming, the smell of burnt flesh mixed with the bitter scent of ancestral blood. "Well... interesting..."
That was all she could say before being thrown against the wall with brutal force. The impact echoed through the Crimson Chapel like muffled thunder. The nearest stained glass window cracked with the shock.
Viper fell to her knees, coughing up a jet of black blood that stained the floor like ink spilled from a cursed pen. Still alive. Still lucid. But not for long, if the presence burning the air around her decided to press on.
Katharina stood before her with the wicked elegance of a queen of hell. The demonic aura around her body rippled like a storm about to break. The shadows trembled. The eyes of the vampires present widened in sheer terror.
"What a joke," she said, her voice sharp as a newly forged blade. "You speak without knowing who you're talking about... You spit on the name of someone who could destroy you all with a snap of her fingers. That's why your race is sinking."
She leaned in, looking at Viper as if examining a wounded animal about to be sacrificed.
"Arrogance without power is foolishness. And foolishness," she smiled, "usually burns well."
Viper tried to activate his regeneration. A spark of energy ran through his body, but died in an instant. His eyes widened in confusion and fear. "What... what the hell is this? Why doesn't it...?"
"Did you lose something?" Katharina asked scornfully, already knowing the answer. "Oh, that's right. My fire is not ordinary. It burns all energy. Every cell in your body begs for rest... but it won't get it."
She then walked to the center of the hall, and each step seemed to increase the air pressure. Centuries-old vampires cowered. Young ones tried not to faint.
Her red hair began to rise, as if caught by a hellish wind. And then, slowly... it caught fire. Living, flaming fire, red as the deepest hells.
"He's not just my husband," she said, without raising her voice, but each word reverberated like thunder in the bones of those present. "He is one of the Demon Kings. A name that Hell whispers. That Heaven fears."
She looked at everyone, her eyes glowing like stars about to explode.
"If you're smart, you'll bow down now... before he comes to teach you the meaning of true power."
Viper, leaning against the wall, blood dripping from the corner of her lips, forced a weak smile. "New Demon King, huh? Then it can only be... Lucifer."
Katharina turned slowly. Her eyes half-closed. The flame in her hair crackled like bottled thunder.
"Oh..." she murmured. "The name of my dear Vergil is on the tip of your tongue, then?"
She took a step forward. A red lightning bolt split the ground around her.
"Do you want me to rip it out?" she asked, tilting her head. "After all... you don't need to say the name of an idiot. Right?"
And then, the flames in her hair grew. Her shadow projected in all directions at once, like a living eclipse. For a second, it seemed as if the Crimson Chapel itself was inside the body of a demonic beast about to devour them.
The air around Viper trembled with the residual heat from Katharina's flames. The vampire was kneeling, breathing heavily, smoke slowly rising from the wound on her neck. And then... something changed.
The already dense atmosphere grew even heavier—as if time itself hesitated to move forward.
On Viper's side, darkness took shape.
No sound, no smell, no warning. It just... appeared. A slender female figure, pale as ivory under the moonlight, eyes that reflected no light. A presence that seemed not to displace air, but compress it around her.
She knelt beside Viper with a fluid, almost feline movement. Her long, gloved fingers touched the vampire's burned neck, and a silvery glow—ancient, cold, and silent as a snowstorm beneath the earth—began to radiate from her palm.
The steaming flesh began to repair itself. The pain gave way to an eerie silence. The regeneration worked, but not because of Viper herself. It was the magic of the newcomer.
Kaguya took a step forward. A pale, thin, and dangerously calm smile spread across her lips.
"I was wondering how long it would take you to come out of your lair... Reven."
The name was spoken as both a sigh and a sentence. The room seemed to shrink in response.
Some vampires whispered among themselves — the name echoed in old legends, secrets kept in the tombs of elders. Reven was not just a healer. She was a legend buried in the bowels of the vampire underworld. A shadow that only appeared when the blood stopped flowing... and began to cry out.
The woman looked up. Her eyes had no pupils. They were two windows into a bottomless void.
"Kaguya," she said, in a soft, icy voice that made the name sound like an ancient epitaph. "You still have a talent for causing earthquakes with words. As always."
She rose slowly, her hand now clean of any trace of blood. Viper, still kneeling, touched her throat and took a deep breath, returned to full consciousness.
Reven stared at Katharina for a moment, but not with fear—rather with a rare kind of analysis that only monsters of the same level knew how to use.
"I heard your discussion," Raven said. "I'd like to hear more about this... Demon King." She said as her eyes began to redden.
"B-but R-even," Viper stammered.
"Let's hear it. Kaguya is too proud to come here without something that really interests us," Reven said and turned her gaze to Kaguya, "Right?"
"We haven't seen each other in a hundred years, and yet you still know me so well," Kaguya smiled.