“So for the next few days, you’re temporarily free…”
As Utia’s words fell, an eerie silence spread outward.
Sylvie’s face still showed no obvious expression.
There was no relief at being able to rest for a few days.
No joy at not having to feel pain.
Nor was there any so-called disappointment one might expect from a loyal, obedient pet blood slave upon learning she would be separated from her master.
What remained was only a calm so deep it was nearly deathly—utter emptiness.
“Sylvie understands,” she replied.
Then she bowed slightly.
“Then… Sylvie will take her leave first.”
Having said that, she turned around and left without the slightest hesitation.
…
Sulga’s cold gaze followed Sylvie until her figure vanished at the bottom of the long staircase.
He did not turn to look at anything else.
He spoke as if to himself, yet also as if posing a question to someone nearby.
“She has become even more ‘obedient’ than before, more capable of recognizing her own ‘position’… This is a good thing.”
As he spoke, he suddenly turned his head toward Utia, who was leaning against the door with her arms crossed, silent.
“Don’t you think so, Utia.”
A cold laugh drifted out from that shadow-shrouded figure, filled with undisguised mockery.
Utia lifted her head slightly.
Those crimson eyes held no mirth at all, only spreading frost.
“Of course. Absolute obedience is the only way to survive in vampire society, isn’t it.”
“That’s the ‘iron law’ our kind has summarized through domination and arrogance.”
Utia’s voice was slow and sharp.
Her gaze passed over Sulga, settling on the place where Sylvie had disappeared.
“Recognize your position, offer absolute loyalty and submission, squeeze out your last bit of value, and then…”
“Quietly, without complaint, welcome the inevitable end.”
“I’m glad you’ve finally come to understand this,” Sulga praised without restraint.
“Her Majesty the Queen will be very pleased to hear such words.”
Yet his mechanical, numb face and his perfectly even tone made it impossible to read any true emotion.
Utia let out another soft scoff.
This time, however, it was no longer ridicule or contempt.
It was a self-mocking laugh, hiding something difficult to perceive, laden with unclear meaning.
“Yes… she will be very pleased.”
………………
The corpses along the roads were mostly cleared away in just one night.
At first, Sylvie assumed it was the vampire enforcers cleaning up the “masterpieces” they had left behind.
It was only when she saw some blood livestock dragging bodies toward the outer city that she realized the truth.
It was the blood livestock themselves.
On the second day after their desperate escape attempt, they were forced to drag the corpses of their own family members and friends, throwing them outside for the man-eating monsters beyond the walls to deal with.
Tragic—yet reasonable.
Or rather, why had Sylvie ever believed that those vampires, arrogant and conceited beyond saving, would be willing to dirty their own hands and personally carry out the “cleanup”?
…
She pulled her cloak back on, hiding her face.
She lowered her head, refusing to look at the blood livestock along the roadside, faces twisted in pain and helplessness as they dragged corpses away.
A wave of guilt—so intense it nearly defied description—swept over her already numb heart, leaving Sylvie on the verge of vomiting.
She did not dare meet the eyes of those suffering blood livestock.
Her body trembled faintly.
………
Fortunately.
Lady Cassia’s hiding place had not been discovered.
This ruined building, long left without maintenance, looked as though it could collapse at any moment, which was why no blood livestock were willing to live here.
Of course, there was an even more important reason.
It was very close to the vampires’ residential area.
Settling down here was no different from a sheep moving into a pack of wolves.
At the end of the room, on the white bed, Cassia still sat there.
She had turned her head toward the window, gazing at the scenery outside in silence.
Her blood-red eyes were calm and dim, their thoughts unreadable.
“Lady Cassia… sorry, I’m late.”
Sylvie’s voice was weaker than usual, carrying exhaustion that refused to fade.
Cassia did not respond.
She did not even ask why Sylvie had suddenly disappeared for a time.
She remained as cold and distant as ever.
Sylvie stepped into the room and slowly came to Cassia’s side.
She seemed to want to say something, yet only lowered her head, letting the hood of her cloak cover most of her face, leaving only a pale chin exposed.
A heavy silence, unlike before, filled the air.
Cassia withdrew her gaze from the window and slowly turned her blood-red eyes toward Sylvie in the corner.
Those eyes, once arrogant and sharp, now沉淀—now settled with darkness and hatred—keenly caught the despair and numbness radiating from Sylvie, almost solid in their intensity.
“Um… Lady Cassia.”
Sylvie suddenly called out hoarsely.
Her hands, resting on her legs, slowly clenched.
After hesitating for a long time, she finally dared to continue.
“Just treat it as me talking to myself… could you let me… vent a little?”
Her tone sounded like a request, yet more like a desperate statement.
Sylvie knew that her venting, her pain, even her plea, would not receive any response from Lady Cassia.
But precisely because of that—
Precisely because she knew she would receive no response.
Precisely because she knew Lady Cassia did not care about her suffering at all.
That was why she wanted to speak.
Because she could no longer bear alone the sorrow that was nearly crushing her soul.
Because… in this icy city.
Cassia was the only one who could hear her speak.
…
The air froze for a moment.
Cassia said nothing, her blood-red eyes still watching her coldly.
She was neither given permission nor refused.
Yet to Sylvie, this silence was perhaps already a form of tacit consent.
It was the only excuse she could grasp—allowing herself to be “weak” for just a moment.
She took a deep breath, the sound trembling.
“…Outside… a lot of people died.”
She finally spoke, her voice as light as a dream.
“A lot of… blood livestock were… purged.”
“The Queen said… it was ‘optimization’… ‘refinement’… to… save resources…”
As she spoke, she slowly wrapped her arms around herself, unconsciously holding tight, as though trying to feel the only warmth she had left.
She paused for a long while, as if she had exhausted all her strength, before continuing.
“They were… killed because of me…”
“Master… the Queen… she said it was because of me. Because she wanted to see whether I would be angry… so she ordered… the purge… to kill them…”
Her voice began to fracture, words tumbling out incoherently, as pain and guilt sank ever deeper into her bones.
“I… I didn’t know… I didn’t know it would be like this… I only… I only gave them a little food… I just… I didn’t want to see them so hungry… I just…”
She choked, her thoughts in chaos.
“I know… in Eternal Night City, you can’t have extra feelings… can’t care about anything… I know all of that… but… they were so small… so thin… when they called me big sister…”
Sylvie’s body trembled violently under the strain of extreme repression.
“…Now… outside… there’s blood everywhere… those people dragging corpses… they’re crying… I don’t dare look at them… I feel like… their eyes… are all looking at me… like they’re saying… ‘It’s all because of you’…”
“But… but…”
“I didn’t want this!!!”
That numbness.
That emptiness.
That deathly stillness.
When they finally shattered, what was revealed beneath them was… a young girl’s instinctive fragility.