Ascendant Path of a Lustful Vampire

Arlette went on to explain to Caius that it might still be a while before the Legacy was delivered to her. As part of Caius's own order, every piece of it was to be brought to him so that he could assess and take what he wanted.

Allegra, in life, was not a woman lacking in means. After all, she was a genius who essentially created a Manuscript to cheat the nature ordained by the Goddess Nyx right from the creation of Vampires. Something that Alchemical knowledge, which had grown even more since then, had failed to accomplish.

In the original story, the Manuscript was introduced to rile up the Vampires of the story.

Caius could still remember how he—as Kevin in his old life—had once complained in the comment section that Vampires had very little to do with the story even though Caius was one. Many other readers had fired back at him then that the story was about Aurelius and a Vampire plot for Caius meant little to it. They thought it had happened too much already.

Caius could still remember exchanging words with Ass_Blaster_42 on that issue. But following that, despite never weighing in one way or the other, Sam_Ellis had introduced this plot. It satisfied both sides;

It was a Vampire Plot and even served as a moment of temptation for Caius who now had to choose between letting go of his principles to not become a True Vampire (a monster) or accepting a much quicker path to power.

At the core of it all, however, it was still Aurelius's story. Much happened but at the end of it all, it was he who found 'Alergra's Legacy'. It was he who found the vestige of Divinity within the legacy that proved to be the 'true treasure' rather than the Evolution charge-cheating manuscript.

It was also Aurelius who got hunted down for the Manuscript leading to more occurrences with Caius never too far behind seeing as Vampires were his specialty. Either because he was a Vampire Spawn or because he was a member of the Monster-hunting, Vampire-Killing Von Helsing Family and proudly carried on the family business.

In any case, one can easily understand the allure of the Manuscript and why it sent Vampires into such a frenzy. Hell, the look of desire for such a treasure had been clear in the faces of the Leopold Vampires when they heard of it.

And why wouldn't they crave it?

It had been centuries since Kerwin Leopold himself became a Vampire and he had only advanced a single circle with the next still so far. Even by calculations, he was going to need thousands and thousands of kills to achieve his goals. And that was if they went after actually strong targets.

Go after targets below the Fourth Circle and Kerwin would need tens and tens and tens of thousands of Victims for a single Circle advancement. Maybe even more. And then, there was the entirety of the Coven to think about.

It was why he wanted to secure rulership over the Acheron Empire to allow more indiscriminate feedings. Something they couldn't quite do at the moment.

Anyway, with the Manuscript, those requirements could be cut down drastically. From thousands to hundreds. Still substantial but far more manageable.

Thinking of that, Caius remembered having yet another argument with Ass_Blaster_42 about which of the two acquisitions was better and how 'Allegra's Manuscript' was useless to the plot as only the Vestige of Divinity mattered because of Aurelius and who he was in his past life.

Caius—back then, Kevin_The_Man—had tried to dispute this even though he should have known he was being silly. His argument was for Ass_Blaster_42 to think about what the Manuscript could do for Caius. If Caius embraced Vampirism and his strength increased exponentially, would it not also serve Aurelius's story as well since the Main character would now have a powerful ally?

At that point, Aurelius's divine nature had been revealed and he was sure to acquire divinity anyway so the Vestige of Divinity was almost pointless because of that. On the other hand, the Manuscript was the one chance in the story to see a Vampire fight on the side of 'good' as, up until that point, they were all irredeemable monsters.

It had been such a heated back and forth and thinking on it now, Caius could only smile.

He found his arguments to be silly now. He also found Ass_Blaster_42's argument to be silly as well. Neither the Manuscript nor the Vestige was more important than the other. Not to him anyway.

Aurelius had a path to Divinity no matter what, but Caius Von Helsing did not. In that case, could he possibly discard the Vestige in favor of the Manuscript? Of course not.

He had to have them both.

Caius went on already making plans for 'Allegra's Legacy'. It was now in possession of 'Ophiuchus' and would be with him sooner than later. He wondered if it would arrive early enough to come in handy for the Mid-Semester Tests but was unsure. There was work to be done with the Manuscript and the Vestige of Divinity for them to be useful to him.

And even if it could be put to instantaneous use, it wasn't an immediate solution. He only had three people he was currently feeding on and even if he increased the Evolution charge within them, with such short feeding periods and the lack of consistency with any of them except Arlette, achieving the Fourth Circle in the few weeks before the Tests might not be possible.

'Shall I speed things up?' He asked himself.

And then he shook his head at how unlikely to succeed such a plan was;

Delia was too unsure of her feelings at the moment to handle the reveal.

Anne Gilligan was on the right path and could be helped along by involving her daughter but… it wasn't a sure thing. Maybe.

Eloise hadn't learned of his nature despite how close they had become and Caius had planned to ease her in but wondered if he could just rip off the metaphoric band-aid and hope she was as accepting as she seemed to be. He wasn't second-guessing his effect on her… He was just considering how much of the shock of the reveal it could absorb.

Cynthia Kragsten was many steps away from that point and Caius had just found a routine in her dance moves that he could take advantage of and did not want to jeopardize his progress.

And then, there was Aylin;

Interestingly, she was the one Caius felt he could reveal himself to the most easily. He was sure Aylin's infatuation with him—an infatuation he had taken care to foster quite nicely thus far—would be enough. She might even grab on to it as a secret of his she got to keep and would bring her and him closer together.

Of course, if she found out Kaya knew first, this might get turned on its head. Which was one of the major reasons Caius couldn't really consider her. Not until she had gone through the educational program she was currently on by listening to the amorous tales Kaya and Eloise had to tell and building up a tolerance.

So all in all; Aylin was a possible quick feeding acquisition but it would likely be better to wait until she was properly stable in certain matters.

With a sigh, Caius decided he couldn't rush things.

In any case, he hadn't planned on being at the Fourth Circle for the Tests. It could be survived without that. After all, he was already taking steps to ensure it could be survived without an Advancement.

"Master Caius," Roland, the Von Helsing Estate's chief Butler greeted as Caius exited the carriage that had now gotten him home.

"Afternoon, Roland," Caius greeted.

"It is here, Master Caius," Roland said with a bow.

"What…?" Caius started to ask and then smiled, knowing already of the one thing he had requested for in recent memory;

An Alchemical Set of his own.

It didn't take a day for it all to be purchased. Not with his family's means.

A very spacious room adjacent to his bedroom was prepared just for his newly acquired, high-end kits. Now, Caius would not only have to be at Arlette's private residence to practice Alchemy which was his one truly available card for the trials to come.

He grinned, rolling up the sleeves of his uniform, not at all bothered to take them off before he stepped up to the kit, nodding his head as he said,

"Let's get to work."