Augustus Mansion Raid Part 1

Augustus Mansion Raid Arc -Start-

Odd Jobs enters the vast courtyard lined with lamp posts and decorated with Greek-esque sculptors. One of Patrick's hobbies is reading literature on the long artistic history of Shioto which is less prevalent nowadays, these statues represent his taste. Around 20 yards in front of them is the massive Augustus Mansion, one of many which is guarded by 30 vampires. None of them appear to be pushovers. Wasting no time, the large number of enemies pushes them.

"We don't have time for these small fry. Iris, you can handle them, right?"

"Eh? I have to go against so many again?"

"Protect Diego while you're at it. Let's go you two!"

Ariel, Shinatsu, and Kagura go ahead, cutting down the few vampires who got in their way. With the Vampire Lord using her brute strength again, she breaks down the front door and they enter.

"They really left us to fight this many vamps?!" Diego questions while unsheathing his newly acquired blade.

Iris saw how Ariel was looking at her. She has complete confidence in her abilities. To prepare herself, she slaps her cheeks two times in a row. "I-I can do it! We got this, Diego!"

"I sure hope so."

"The fangs are inside, we just need to kill these two Hunters here, One of the vampires shouts.

The battle begins.

The vampires once again commence their charge and surround the two who stayed. Iris goes for the closest one but her slash is caught. These vampires are stronger than the ones she fought in the parking lot last year, telegraphed attacks won't work even if they are quick. This caught her by surprise and opened up a moment's hesitation. She wasn't alone though. Diego was there to immediately follow up, jumping over Iris to slash the vampire across his neck. The cut wasn't deep enough, it would be healed in a few seconds. But this was enough for Iris to get herself back together, relinquishing the vampire's hold of her blade by severing his fingers, she's able to land a fatal blow. This was all in under 10 seconds, the other vampires are closing in on them. With their backs leaning on one another, Iris and Diego are ready.

Bouncing off each other, they defend against the onslaught of vampire attacks, not going for any lethal blows yet but just chipping away at them. If they lose their blade, that's the end for them so they can't be careless. After a few slashes, Iris takes another one down. Diego is being overwhelmed however, over 20 vampires at once is too much for him. Before he can take any damage, Iris covers for him. Her first slash cuts across 2 vampires at once. The following instant, a vampire lunges at her who she pierces with a precise stab to the heart. Instead of retracting her blade, she digs a slash through the left of the vampire's abdomen causing liters of blood to pour out. Blood has never been a big deal to Iris mentally. She's a big fan of horror movies, but that's beside the point. This is the first time Diego has been exposed to so much open blood, on top of the intestines that spilled out, he was on the verge of throwing up but held himself back. They're in the middle of a fight after all. The vampires continue to put on the pressure, but Diego comes up with a witty idea.

"Iris, hop onto my hands!"

Diego forms a platform with his hands. Not questioning him, Iris follows his plan. Not knowing what was to come, she yelled when the said plan was enacted.

"WOOOOOOAAAAH!"

"Just like that!"

Diego's bright idea was to spin Iris around like a bladed twister while cutting down the vampires who jumped at them. It worked quite well, taking down a few of them.

"Haha.. I can't believe that worked."

"P-Please don't do that again!"

"But it worked so well!" Mid-sentence, a vampire was about to land an attack on Diego but he baited him into doing that by letting his guard down. As a result, he was able to cut him down. "Alright, that's my first kill!"

"We're not done yet.."

"Yeah, let's wrap this up."

***

Ariel, Kagura, and Shinatsu entered the Grand foyer, its walls are full of Renaissance-esque paintings illuminated by chandeliers. 6 corridors can be seen, 2 going left and right, 2 going straight ahead, and the other two leading to opposite directions upstairs. There's some obstacles standing in their path. But Ariel couldn't care less about them, she feels Chifuyu's presence upstairs to the right.

"Only 4 vamps inside?" Shinatsu questions.

"These guys are probably even stronger than the ones outside," answers Kagura.

"Can I leave these guys to you? I'm making a beeline for Chifuyu."

"Sure. Could you take one out real quick though? It won't be much of a drag if there's one less."

"I'll try."

As Ariel prepares to dash forward, one of the vampires standing in their way shouts obnoxiously.

"SILENCE YOU FOOLS! YOU ARE IN THE PRESENCE OF THE GREAT INYAKI!!" The boisterous vampire is dressed somewhat like a jester with a white and red eye mask and lipstick on. The color scheme is mostly black and white with some red and purple thrown in. His silky hair is dyed black and white with some red highlights. The female vampire next to him has the same thing going on.

"Shut up, we don't have time for your clown act." Surprisingly, one of the other vampires steps in. "The traitor is right in front of us!"

He activates his curse, staring directly at Ariel, something begins to affect her. Her eyes open in shock, sweat starts to profusely form and drip down her face, it feels as if her bones are chilling and her heartbeat rapidly increases. But she gets her composure back in a matter of seconds. Ariel's bloodlust shoots through the roof.

"What'd you do to me?"

The vampire who activated his curse immediately jumps back in fear, but it's too late. Ariel has already ripped his head off of his body. The symptoms she was feeling disappeared.

'Looks like the symptoms of whatever curse he used on me ceased after he died.' Ariel sighs with relief. "I'm going on ahead now. Unless any of you wanna stop me."

"Nope, you're free to go."

With that, she darts upstairs. Chloe, the female vampire looks at Inyaki with disgusted astonishment.

"What, you wanna end up like him?"

"No, I know I shouldn't be surprised. Patrick has a means to deal with her, that buffoon got ahead of himself."

"Yeah, so anyway.. Back to my introduction. I AM—"

"Say, you with the orange-reddish hair.." The third vampire speaks.

"Uh.. yeah?"

"Wanna go on a date?"

"All these vampires are idiots," Shinatsu sighs.