Ascendant Path of a Lustful Vampire

Caius and Eloise had found themselves in the fortunate position of not being on the Bullcroc's radar. At least not when so many of their classmates were still attacking it from multiple sides.

That gave them the chance to actually think about the situation as the others probably didn't have the luxury to because any lapse in concentration would get them attacked.

In [To Kill Demon Lord…], this moment didn't get to play out on page. It was only referred to during the Mid-Semester Tests and it had actually involved a different Beast. This was because, both in the story and this reality, Lea had prepared different options for this exercise and for reasons, most likely due to changes Caius had caused thus far, she picked a different option here than she had in the novel.

In other words, Caius couldn't just call on the knowledge he had from the novel to help him out this time as he had done with the Fire Cracking Lizard. He was just as confused as the rest of the class on the actual details of this exercise.

And just like some of the more sharp ones (which were the majority to be honest considering every student was, on some level, a genius) had figured out that they were not in any real danger, Caius knew as well.

The attack he had suffered earlier should have hurt more than it did. Somehow, the Bullcroc was pulling its punches. Metaphorically of course since it really just went charging at targets with its snout and not any of its limbs. Besides its tail.

Anyway, it was easy to understand that the Beast and Lea Gilligan had an understanding for this exercise. It wasn't supposed to maim the students too badly which was why they could all roll over on the ground groaning in pain rather than having their chests completely caved in from the attacks they had suffered.

Still, this was an exercise they were supposed to beat. Letting the Bullcrock smack them around and knock them down wasn't really going to cut it. They had to win. And if Lea had gone through the trouble of setting this all up—crazy as she was—it meant this was a winnable fight.

Ganging up on three Beast was never going to work.

Its defenses were far too sturdy to be broken through by Third Circle spells which were basically all that they were all capable of. They needed an exploitable weakness and Caius knew exactly where they would find it.

"Eloise, your notes," He had told the golden-brown haired beauty who still had her arms around him as they watched their classmates battle the Beast and remain on the losing end.

"Huh?" Eloise had answered.

"Last week's class… You took notes didn't you?" Caius had said, "The answer is in there."

Given enough time, that weakness would have probably been figured out but why bother when there was a relatively easier way? Plus, Lea herself had encouraged it by saying they could win if they had paid attention in her class.

Probably no one paid more attention, as far as note-taking was concerned in Study of Magical Beasts class, than Eloise.

"Oh right," she had answered and then pulled out her notebook to peruse it.

But then came the issue; it was too much.

They always had a double period for Study of Magical Beasts class but a few hours of that was usually spent actually studying a particular Beast practically. It was how they had done the two classes before last week's class anyway.

Last week's class however, had been hours of straight-up dictation and note-taking. Nothing ever really in-depth about the Beasts they were learning about. Just rough knowledge that Lea continued to pour out.

A few students had even joked that she might have just wanted to impress them with just how much she knew about how many Beasts. And there were a lot. Some Beasts even have variations belonging to different Star Threat Levels which causes enough distinction to make the knowledge hardly transferable.

That said, despite the overload of information, A keen student would have seen that Lea focused on Four-Star Beasts the most. Maybe with the occasional Five Star Beasts peppered in but there was a clear pattern. She was basically telling them of all the various Beasts that they could have to face in the coming weeks and during the Mid-Semester Tests. It was always about weaknesses that could be exploited and a bit of in-depth stuff about those weaknesses before they were off to the next.

Lea talked about more than a hundred Beasts. Spanning over twenty pages of Eloise's notebook in that single day of Lecture.

To look through all those pages and find what might amount to a paragraph of information smooched up with others was a bit like torture. This was because Lea spoke in such single breaths that one might be lost on where to put punctuations or when to be sure a sentence had ended. Much less a paragraph.

It was why she had been so studiously in her notes and had not acknowledged Aylin's greeting even though she actually didn't hate the Ice Mage as much as Kaya did and probably wanted her to.

The vial in Caius's hand of course contained the Wyvern Trait Acquisition Potion. He looked ready to down it but knew he had to time it well. The moment that liquid went into his body, he would be running down a clock and that would be a waste while he was just standing by Eloise's side and not quite in the ongoing fight.

And when Eloise announced her success, he beamed.

"Of course you did," he said, "I knew you could."

It was deserving of praise. Lea spoke of so much that Caius would hardly have been surprised or all that disappointed of it turned out that Eloise had skipped that piece of information. She just might have gotten lost in the dictation at the time.

But she hadn't.

Eloise read the few lines of information on the Bullcroc and her lips turned up in a smirk.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me," she said.

"What is it?"

"It's sound," Eloise said and looked up at Caius, "It's fucking sound."

"Huh," Caius let out.

He remembered how Eloise had caught the attention of the Beast and had it come barreling right at her. It had been because she spoke in such a shrill tone that it sent out sonic ripples.

He had simply brushed that aside as sound catching the attention of the Beast, but with this, it was likely more than that.

"Caius, listen to this," Eloise said and recited from her notes,

"The Bullcroc possesses defenses that can put even the best of Fourth Circle spells to the test. It is relatively slow in comparison to Fourth Circle movement spells but makes up for it with its formidable Fourth star threat level strength. It has no Elemental Affinity.

Susceptible to sound. I.e it gets very irritated when they are high-pitched and can be soothed when they are low-pitched. In other words, when stared down, try a lullaby."

Eloise looked up from her notes then and she laughed cheerlessly once while glancing over at Professor Gilligan who was looking back at her and grinning with just a bit of disappointment. Like she couldn't believe it had taken Eloise so long to figure it out.

Eloise caught that look and she laughed even more.

"You have to be kidding me. What was I supposed to do, burst into a song when that thing showed up and started charging?

Whose mind would even arrive at that as the first course of action?!"