The young vampires who heard Zeke's words panicked and exchanged glances.
Even the Red Eye vampires, who were famous for their fearlessness, couldn't move rashly because the aura emanating from Zeke was clearly extraordinary at a glance.
At that moment, the door to the tattoo parlor opened, and someone stepped out.
Her exposed arms and even her neck were covered in dense tattoos, and she was a paleskinned woman with piercings in her eyebrows and nose.
She put a cigarette in her mouth, lit it, and exhaled a puff of smoke.
Then, in a languid voice, she said,
"They're our customers. Take that guy over there and go."
At her words, the vampires were startled and dragged the fallen gang member away, disappearing somewhere.
She offered Zeke a cigarette from her relaxed posture.
When Zeke shook his head, she slowly finished her cigarette, tossed it to the ground, and stubbed it out with her foot before finally speaking to him.
"Come in."
Zeke followed the vampire woman into the shop.
It looked like a genuine tattoo parlor in operation, with chairs placed here and there, and the tattoo beds submerged in disinfectant solution.
"Thinking of getting a tattoo?"
When she asked him as he looked around, Zeke shook his head again.
"Boring."
She muttered lazily and led Zeke to the back of the building.
Once behind the building, she opened a door on the floor, revealing stairs leading underground.
Zeke followed the vampire woman down.
As they descended the stairs, she suddenly said,
"I heard you're brothers with Bacchus, but you don't look alike." Zeke didn't respond to that.
The vampire woman didn't seem to expect an answer and silently continued down to the basement without asking further.
Soon, they reached the end of the stairs and saw a door ahead.
She knocked on the door twice.
"It's me, Niki."
Then, the door slid open smoothly.
Inside, a burly vampire man with a full beard and covered in tattoos eyed Niki and Zeke. He gestured silently for them to enter.
As they went inside, surprisingly, the dark hall was filled with dazzling lights created by magic, and dozens of vampires were dancing while rubbing against each other.
'What was this place?'
looked around at them and sensed humans interspersed among them.
But they all seemed entranced by the vampires' hypnosis and soma, their eyes glazed over.
In one corner, vampires embraced each other, drank blood from severed human heads, then kissed and rolled around.
Zeke realized this was a feeding ground for the vampires.
'I'd heard rumors, but this was the first time I'd seen it for real.'
The rumor Zeke had heard was that vampires lured humans into a state of extreme pleasure and then extracted and drank their fresh blood in a separate place.
He had wondered if such a place really existed, but this seemed to be it. The entire space was thick with the scent of blood from the vampires' meals.
Ignoring them, Zeke followed Niki's guidance through the noisy hall to a quiet room inside.
"Zeke Draker."
As he entered the room, Bacchus stood up from his seat and stepped in front of Zeke.
The vampires embedded in the neutral city had detected Zeke's presence the moment he set foot in the city.
And they had quickly relayed that information to Bacchus.
When Zeke removed his transformation cloak, he returned to his original appearance.
Then Niki looked at Zeke intently and nodded.
"You do look alike."
Bacchus ignored Niki's comment and said to Zeke,
"Sit over here. I prepared some tea since I heard you were coming." Zeke sat down, and Bacchus skillfully brewed the tea and handed him a cup.
After sipping the tea, Zeke nodded in satisfaction.
"Good tea."
Zeke glanced at Bacchus's regenerated left arm.
"Is the regenerated arm not uncomfortable?" At those words, Bacchus gave a wry smile.
"There's nothing like that in particular. Anyway, thanks to you, the Black Stage's pursuit has stopped."
In truth, it wasn't so much that the Black Stage had stopped pursuing because of Zeke's intervention, but rather that Arthur Draker was leaving Bacchus and Carmilla alone.
Since Zeke had become aware of them, Arthur's side seemed to be planning to watch and wait for now.
Bacchus, who led an intelligence organization, must have been aware of this to some extent.
Bacchus took a sip of his tea and asked Zeke,
"You came sooner than expected. I thought it would take a bit longer."
Zeke looked at Bacchus and said,
"Two birds with one stone. I had business in the neutral city anyway." At those words, Bacchus spoke first.
"Is it because of the Alchemistsʼ Union?"
set down his teacup upon hearing Bacchus's response. "Are you digging into my affairs?" Bacchus shook his head.
"It's something I naturally learned about while being here. I heard that the Union is really troubled these days because of the new medicine from Feynen Pharmaceuticals." Zeke nodded calmly and opened his mouth.
"Since they've been making exorbitant profits with inferior drugs until now, it's no wonder they're reacting sensitively to the new medicine."
"It's not something you can take so lightly."
Bacchus also set down his teacup and said,
"I think the Alchemistsʼ Union will respond with their all-in this matter. As you said, if that new medicine comes out to the world, the Union will be quickly phased out." Zeke clicked his tongue and frowned.
"But refusing authorization and certification for a perfectly fine medicine—does that even make sense?"
"There are many ways. They could use the fact that the raw material is soma as an excuse, saying there's a risk of addiction if abused, or claim there's some stability issue we're not aware of yet."
Zeke made an incredulous expression at those words.
"That's just nitpicking."
"From their perspective, they have to block the release of that medicine somehow. Anyway..."
Bacchus looked at Zeke and continued,
"You're here to ask about that, right? To get information that can strike at the Alchemistsʼ Union's rear."
Zeke nodded at Bacchus's words.
But in truth, the information on the Alchemistsʼ Union wasn't Zeke's real goal.
Through his past life's knowledge, he already knew about the Union's corruption and the weaknesses of its key executives.
The reason he came to Bacchus was to compare the information he knew with what they had, to gauge the level of the vampires' intelligence capabilities.
'I needed to assess if they were at a level worth dealing with, and how they compared to the syndicate.'
Bacchus looked at Zeke and handed over documents he had prepared in advance.
"This is information on the Alchemistsʼ Union."
It seemed he had prepared it in advance even before Zeke arrived.
He quickly skimmed through the documents Bacchus handed over without a word.
Then, he inwardly admired the unexpected results.
'It was more detailed and systematically organized than what I knew.'
Bacchus's experience with the Draker Black Stage made his skill in handling information unquestionable.
What surprised Zeke was that the causal relationships of each piece of information and the connections to related individuals were meticulously investigated and recorded.
"How about this? It should be enough to replace the syndicate, don't you think?" Bacchus had also read Zeke's intention to test them and prepared in advance. closed the documents and looked at Bacchus.
"Honestly, I didn't think you'd have intelligence capabilities to this extent. It's beyond expectations."
"The Draker Black Stage is a piece of shit, but it was a good place to learn how to handle information. Combining information from Red Eye, which has footholds across the entire continent, its connected lower organizations, and the high-end brothels connected to our side, even you would be surprised by the results it can produce."
In terms of intelligence, Zeke had no choice but to acknowledge Bacchus.
He too had formed an intelligence unit centered on Boris, but strictly speaking, it was closer to a sabotage unit than an intelligence organization.
It was clear that having Bacchus on Zeke's side would be a great help, since Zeke was relatively weak in intelligence.
Zeke looked at Bacchus and said,
"Where's Carmilla? I want to meet her in person and hear what she has to say." At those words, Bacchus shook his head.
"You can't see Mother right now."
"Has her body not recovered since the resurrection?" Bacchus's expression subtly changed.
"That seems to be the case. I can't say in detail what the situation is, but communication is difficult right now."
"Then, when can I see Carmilla?"
"At least three weeks from now."
"Three weeks from now..."
Zeke nodded and stood up from his seat.
"I understand. How should I contact you?"
Bacchus took out a communicator orb from his pocket and handed it to Zeke.
Then, he gestured to Niki, who was lying on the sofa behind him.
She rose slowly with a languid motion.
"This is a secure communicator orb. Contact us through this when needed, and Niki will act as the intermediary when we meet in person."
Zeke pocketed the secure communicator orb and looked at Niki.
"You don't seem like an assassin or a swordsman. A mage?"
At those words, Niki stared at Zeke and said,
"I'm an illusionist. If you were an ordinary man instead of you, you'd be groveling like a dog by now, licking my feet after falling for my seduction."
It was because Zeke had the indomitable will skill that he wasn't ensnared by the vampire's illusion or seduction.
Bacchus looked at Niki and said,
"Niki, I told you not to use illusions on just anyone."
At Bacchus's words, Niki turned her head sharply and lay back on the sofa in a slumped posture.
Zeke looked at Bacchus and said,
"Your comrades have such strong personalities; it must never be boring."
"..."
He patted Bacchus's shoulder, who was shaking his head, and left the Red Eye secret hideout, returning to the hotel he had designated as his lodging.
The mischievous twins didn't return until late at night.
Since they had caused so much trouble, just going around delivering flowers one by one had taken up the whole day.
Under Zeke's watch, they had no choice but to sleep very obediently.
*
The next day, a welcome guest visited the hotel where Zeke was staying.
"Please come in, Princess."
It was none other than Princess Melissa of Alencia.
The princess looked even more mature and elegant than before.
"It's been a while, Sir Zeke."
When Zeke first dealt with Melissa, he was just a genius knight with potential.
But now, Zeke had completely changed from back then.
He was the one who had set unprecedented records across the continent and risen to great fame.
Even Melissa, who had a rational fondness for him, now felt that he had become too distant, like a star in the sky out of reach.
Unaware of such feelings, Zeke ordered breakfast for Melissa, and the two enjoyed a leisurely morning meal.
Melissa looked at Zeke and said,
"I've reviewed what you sent. The Alchemistsʼ Union is being utterly unreasonable."
The new medicine from Feynen Pharmaceuticals was to be handled for sale by the Reinhart Trading Company, owned by Princess Melissa.
But without authorization and certification from the Alchemistsʼ Union, selling it across the continent was impossible.
That was why he had called Princess Melissa, the de facto owner of the Reinhart Trading Company, to negotiate with the Alchemistsʼ Union together.
Zeke nodded at Princess Melissa's words and said,
"Even if you and I speak, the Union probably won't grant the authorization and certification."
At those words, Princess Melissa was startled.
"No, even if I can understand that, Sir Zeke is a guardian knight of the Draker family... No matter what, the Alchemistsʼ Union won't be that stubborn. I think they'll come around to negotiating on price adjustments."
Zeke noticed that in Melissa's abbreviated words, 'What kind of retaliation are you planning?' was omitted.
No matter how much the Alchemistsʼ Union acted like gangsters, compared to the Draker family, they were like a drop in the bucket.
If the Draker family clashed with the Union, it would be the Union that suffered.
But Zeke had no intention of using the family's power to pressure them.
He planned to thoroughly correct the Alchemistsʼ Union's bad habits in his own way this time.
He said to Princess Melissa,
"Princess, do you remember the contract I made with Cliff before?"
It had been quite a while, and Zeke himself had forgotten about it until recently.
He had asked Cliff for three favors: the first was to secure a ship to the south to deal with Don Juan, and the second was to borrow a Reinhart Trading Company ship to the islands of the South Sea to rescue Kali.
And the last favor remained.
Melissa looked at Zeke and said,
"Of course. Please tell me."
Zeke slowly opened his mouth toward Melissa.
"I want to create a new alchemists' association centered on the Reinhart
Trading Company."