Acquired death attribute magic skills!
An announcement rang out inside his brain. It was around the time his head finally stopped lolling around that Vandal managed to learn death attribute magic once again. Considering he had learned it for himself in his previous life, he hadn’t expected it to take so long to do it again.
Two months of trying to turn my magical power into magic and failing. My hard work has finally paid off.
That said, his abilities were limited to Death to Bacteria, which killed all microbes within a certain radius, and Death to Bugs, which was the same thing but for insects. He also had Magic Absorption Barrier, which could create a barrier that absorbed any magic that touched it.
Unfortunately, these skills lacked a discernable, visible effect. He wanted to let Dalshia know he could use magic, but that was difficult with his current tool set. Absorbing her magic right in front of her eyes might have made an impact, but she never used elemental magic in front of him. She might have been using elemental magic to create some sparks when starting the cook fire, but that was about it.
I can barely sit up for myself, Vandal thought. I still can’t even see the whole room. Sitting on the bed, Vandal sighed at his current lot in life. His mother chuckled, commenting that he looked like a frumpy old man, but that didn’t bother him. At least she’s taking me outside a little now. I’m so bored in here, boredom might be the thing that kills me.
When the weather was nice, Dalshia had started to take Vandal out with her on walks. She wanted to give him a little more stimulation than what the cave could provide. She was also a little worried about their food stores and wanted to top off their supplies. Vandal recalled how incredibly cautious she had been when they went out for the first time. All Dalshia had done was to open the cave door a crack and let Vandal touch the delicate shaft of light streaking in with his fingertips.
“I’m so glad! That’s one vampire weakness you didn’t inherit!”
Her reaction reminded Vandal again that his father was a vampire. It sounded like an unlucky dhampir could end up having to avoid sunlight for their entire life. Vandal thanked goodness he didn’t take too much after his father.
“This means we can go outside together.”
Once Dalshia got him outside, Vandal was so moved he was at a loss for words—not that he could speak yet anyway.
Wow! The world…all this nature…it’s so big! There was a forest outside the cave, and the air was pure and clear. The sun was bright, the sky a piercing blue, the clouds pure white, and the woods a verdant green. It was a forest, nothing more, but before Hiroto Amemiya and the others finished him off in Origin, he had been locked up like cattle for the better part of twenty years and then died as soon as he got free. His eyes sparkled at every twig and tree around himself.
“You seem to like it outside,” his mother said with a chuckle.
He was still unable to operate his facial expressions, but Dalshia could tell how captivated he was by everything around him, so she set out for a walk and some light gathering. Of course, while carrying little Vandal along, she didn’t do anything as dangerous as hunt animals with a bow or elemental magic. Rather, she gathered edible plants, nuts, and mushrooms, and set up some traps to catch animals. Dalshia ate most of the gathered food, but took a small portion to feed to Vandal.
What a strange feeling. Now he had a young and attractive dark elf spoon-feeding him. Once a day, and only a small amount, but still. That also meant his number of breast feedings was reduced. If he was going to survive that meant leaving the region so dangerous to dhampir and heading for the dark elf village, and that meant he needed to be on solid food, but growing up wasn’t easy to do.
It didn’t help that the milk tasted better than the spoon-fed alternative.
Death attribute magic skill reached level 2! Acquired new skills Resist Maladies, Resist Magic, Night Vision, and Suck Blood!
About five months after Vandal was born, Dalshia started to leave her son for a few hours at a time and go into the forest to gather supplies.
“Just a little longer and we’ll head for my homeland,” she said. “I need to prepare carefully for the trip. I know you’re lonely when I’m gone, but hang in there.”
With that she would go off to hunt beasts, or slip into a village to pick up supplies by pretending to be a wandering adventurer. Sometimes she didn’t come back for half the day, but this was also required for their survival, so Vandal knew she didn’t have a choice. On Earth, people would have called child services on a mother leaving a baby alone for so long, but Vandal didn’t have a problem with it. She was doing all of this to protect him, after all. She really was raising her baby—a half-vampire baby, no less—all alone, without any help from anyone else.
Recognizing that he still hadn’t seen his father, it seemed they couldn’t expect any help from that branch of the family. There were often stories in which vampires despised and denigrated mixed-blood children even more than humans did. Even in Japan, which was supposed to have a highly developed concept of human rights, half-Japanese were discriminated against. So in Ramda, the issue surely applied to mixed-race children.
I might never get to meet my father, Vandal thought. Maybe his father was already dead.
Taking all of that into account, and putting emotion aside and thinking logically, Dalshia would have been better off casting Vandal aside. It would have been smarter, and she would have had an easier life. Nothing tying her down. Fewer burdens to carry. It might be hard for a while, and there might be guilt or suffering, but she’d get over it. Go back to a normal life. If she wanted children, she could go to another country, or back to the dark elf village, find a new man, and do it right this time.
The reason she couldn’t abandon her son, in the face of all the risks, had to be the love she had for his father—and for him.
Hardly the ideal situation, but it’s nice to be loved. That happiness helped fuel Vandal’s continued hard work. When he was awake, he trained with his magic, moved his arms and legs to build his muscles, and practiced making vocal sounds. This all resulted in his death attribute magic level increasing, which in turn finally allowed him to perform magic that Dalshia could see.
“Wow! You’re still a baby but you can use magic? You must be a genius, Vandal!”
He was so happy to be praised for his hard work. So happy that it made her happy. He learned some other skills as well, but they seemed to be the result of just growing up rather than his hard work.
Resist Maladies came from his vampire father, a skill that allowed him to resist everything from poison and sickness to lack of sleep and starvation, as well as the variety of ailments and status conditions that magic might bestow. The Resist Magic skill, meanwhile, came from his dark elf side, mitigating the damage from attack spells. Night Vision came from both sides, allowing him to see as clear as day, even on the most starless night. Suck Blood went without saying. His canine teeth—his fangs—had grown in much faster than his other teeth, and once he had a set above and below he was able to practice.
“I thought you might get those,” his mother said, noticing that her son had fangs. “I don’t think this is such a good idea, but okay.” Dalshia took a rabbit she had captured and chopped off its head with her knife. Then she collected the blood in a wooden saucer. “Here. Drink this.”
Mother, are you crazy? Vandal looked at her with narrowed eyes, the iron smell of blood filling his nose from the saucer in front of him.