Free and Unfettered 82 Developmen

On the collarbone area of the body in front of her, there was a black circle with a cross and a swirling design wrapped around the cross. Just looking at it gave one the chills.

"What is that?" Jasper asked. He had never seen those before. Stunned, he went over to the other bodies and checked.

Sure enough, there were the same marks in various places.

"What did you do?" the Vampire prince asked curiously. He had not seen Nine do anything, and he was absolutely certain that those marks hadn't been there before.

Nine hummed. "It wasn't that these marks weren't here before, but rather, they had been inlaid with a function that causes people to overlook them. Below a certain threshold, the people who look at it will just have their eyes slide over it as if they had already looked at the place when in fact, they were actually overlooking it."

"I see. So now that you've pointed it out, it no longer affects our subconscious," Seyton said, peering at the marks curiously.

Nine ignored them, focusing on the marks. Just by looking at it, one could tell that it wasn't anything good. The mark drew in the darker parts of the darkness element. The parts that most people didn't dare to use lest they lose their sanity.

These were the kinds of marks that heretics used to mark their possessions. What astounded her was that Jasper had managed to collect so many of these bodies without whoever was making them notice.

"Judging by the rate you collected them, these were abandoned. The darkness element in these markings are keeping them 'alive' so to speak, but since they do not contain a soul, they aren't able to move."

They were trying to reproduce the results of necromancy, but these were all failed products. Nine carefully sunk her magic into the rune, realizing that the style being used here was very similar to the markings left in the little alcove where she found Mephisto.

"So that's what they want to do," Nine murmured, puzzling the rest. Though she didn't know about their motives, she could roughly guess what they were about to unleash upon the world.

Nine quickly ordered Mephisto to get her minions to infiltrate the elves and look for more information.

Mephisto made a clicking noise as she complied, happy to be of use to her Master. Rainier emerged from the interspatial bracelet himself and crawled up to Nine's shoulder. Mephisto quickly crawled on top of Rainier, sitting on top of him like a queen on a throne. Rainier wobbled to try and throw off Mephisto, but she lay flat on him, defending her position.

Nine ignored their antics. Cute though they may be, she should bring Jasper into the fold as well. Her instincts were once again telling her that she should rope him in.

"Jasper," Nine said gently, using the Vampiric charm to her advantage. "You'll help us stop a worldwide catastrophe, right?" she said.

The words worked itself into Jasper's brain, but he felt like he couldn't understand them. Just hearing Nine's voice alone was so compelling that he felt like he would obey every order that was spoken to him in that voice alone.

"Yeah," Jasper said without thinking.

Nine smirked at him. Too easy. She didn't even have to use any more of her charm.

Prince Jasper broke out of the trance he had been put in, stunned. He leaned towards Seyton and whispered to him. "Is it just me, or do I feel like I've sold my soul to the devil?"

Seyton looked at his brother with a mock sympathetic look. "Don't worry, brother. All it involves is a lifetime of servitude."

Jasper shivered and shrunk back but didn't take his words back. A man had to honour his promises. That's what he's always believed.

Nine reached out and grabbed Jasper's hand, causing the usually brash prince's face to go up into flames.

What was this feeling? Jasper thought to himself, stunned. That was a man! A full-blooded man. Though his looks were absolutely stunning, he was still a man! Jasper's heart beat faster and faster the longer Nine held on. Why did he feel like he would be alright with this if it was Nine?! He couldn't be gay, could he??

Jasper looked away from Nine's smile and locked eyes with Nocturne. The other Vampire looked like he wanted to devour him alive, stripping flesh from bone, then crush the bone into dust under his feet. Stunned for a different reason, Jasper almost dejectedly remembered that Nine was already married.

"I – Mister Nine, please let go," Jasper uncharacteristically stuttered out.

Seyton looked at his brother with shock. He had never seen the other man behave like this. Not even once. There had been no lack of beauties throwing themselves at him, but he had never even batted an eye. All his Master did was hold his hand for a while, and the other Vampire was behaving like a blushing virgin? Seyton silently gave his Master a thumbs up in his heart. This was just too entertaining.

Nocturne struggled to control himself from slapping Jasper's hand away from Nine but couldn't control his glare at the older Vampire. He felt so jealous! Even he hadn't held Nine's hand before.

Hesitantly, Nocturne walked to Nine and cautiously hooked a finger on Nine's hand.

Surprised, Nine looked at Nocturne, and only saw the top of his head, but between the silver strands, she spotted his red-tipped ears. She couldn't help but feel that Nocturne was behaving rather cutely.

She didn't like admitting it, but Nocturne's behaviour towards herself was unbearably cute most of the time. It just made her feel like bullying him all of the time, but she held herself back, because she knew that his affections for her seemed to be genuine. Since this was the case, then she wouldn't touch him too much until she knew whether she had feelings for him or not.

Ah, but this was just too cute for words. Feeling the amusement creep up on her, she properly grabbed Nocturne's hand, causing him to look up in shock. She studied his face that was dyed red and couldn't help but let go of Jasper's hand and pinch his red cheeks.

So cute!

Why was he so cute? He reacted like this all the time! Nine really wanted him to stop, but at the same time, she didn't want him to as well. He behaved just like a small animal wanting attention.

"You're driving me crazy," Nine couldn't help but say to herself. She hated to admit it, but the faint callings from her magic were urging her to just mate the other Vampire already. When someone's magic reacted this strongly to someone else, it meant that magic had deemed that person their 'best match', but Nine had been struggling to resist against it because she didn't like the feeling that her feelings weren't under her control.

Fine. So be it. It seemed like just by staying at her side, Nocturne's little unconscious actions attracted her very much. She couldn't explain it, but it felt like something tickling at her heart. Even Deltan, her stupid elder brother, didn't make her react this way.

So, her affections for Nocturne seemed to be developing, but… well. It wasn't fun if she made it too easy, right?

A smirk grew on Nine's face at the thought.

Jasper leaned towards Seyton yet again and couldn't help but ask hesitantly. "So…does the human world enforce monogamy? As a Crown Prince, he can marry more people, right?"

Seyton looked at his brother dryly as he caught sight of Nocturne's glare directed at his brother before going back to looking at Nine with a red face again.

"Master can marry a few more people should he want to," Seyton decided to say, throwing his brother into the hot water. If he felt some glee at this, no one would ever know. He still had to get revenge on his brother for taking away his lover even if he knew the truth now.

Nine's lips twitched.

Chapter end