Blood Shaper

“It’s time to move on to full testing,” Zeia said as soon as her meeting with Kay started.

They were in one of the many meeting rooms available in the palace, specifically one of the ones deeper in the complex that were easier to secure. The fact that they were working on countermeasures to the vampyr taint wasn’t a secret, in fact it was a useful morale booster to let the news spread, but the details were a little more restricted. Like Kay had told Eleniah, fighting people’s transformation into vampyr by turning them into vampires was a good thing, but many people would refuse to see the benefits or use that knowledge to further their own goals. Someday, if Kay had his way, vampires would be seen as perfectly normal citizen of Torotia, but until the stigma of the vampyr was ripped out the newly rediscovered species was going to face prejudice and distrust.

“It feels like it’s too early for that. You’ve been working with…” Kay’s face scrunched up in a mixture of embarrassment and distaste, “You’ve been experimenting on my bodily fluids for what, a week or less? That’s nowhere close to long enough to determine what’s dangerous and what’s safe.”

“What else would you have me do?” Zeia asked, “Every test I’ve done shows that we can safely transform someone into a vampire using the methods you’ve described from your original world’s folklore. Without actually trying the process I don’t see how else we can proceed. With your unique version of Purify Blood not being passed down to any of your students, even Lauren who also became a vampire, the only way I’ve been able to find that will allow wide spread treatment of vampyr infection is through changing the victims into vampires.”n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

Eleniah put a hand on Kay’s arm, “Somewhere along the line this became my permanent job, research into different fields can go a lot faster here than on Earth, thanks to Skills and magic. Many researchers have Skills that tell them if certain attempts or theories will be dangerous and at higher tiers there are even Skills that can simulate experiments. No one’s rushing into this without as much preparation as possible.”

Zeia nodded in agreement. “All of my non-combat Classes are research or study based Classes, and all my Skills plus my knowledge tell me that this will be as safe as possible. The only warning I’ve been getting is that allowing large amounts of your ‘venom’ will kill me. Which we already know about.”

“That doesn’t help.” Kay groaned as he dropped his head into his hands. “It doesn’t confirm your theory about the transformation resuscitating the person infected?”

“Ah. Sadly, no. That Class is only tier three and all warnings I get end with death, it doesn’t tell me anything that would hypothetically happen to my body afterward, even if I’d only be a dead body for a few moments.”

Eleniah squeezed his arm.

After a few moments of rough internal debate, Kay glanced up from his hands. “Tell me about your preparations.”

“I’ve already secured a handful of volunteers. They’re fighters that got bitten while performing rearguard actions to get the refugees they were protecting to safety. They all managed to win by the skin of their teeth or just survive somehow and make it to safety, but they’re all infected. All of them are right on the edge of turning, the healers with Classes from your line have been able to stave it off, but they’re losing ground. These people are the ones that attempting to make them into vampires would help the most and they have the least to lose right now.”

“And if you’re wrong and this kills them?”

“Then they died fighting to the end, just like they planned to go. From my end of the table that’s a million times better than being mercy killed before you become a monster.”

Kay stared into Zeia’s eyes, judging her. What she was doing made him think of the doctor who has developed a way to artificially produce insulin. The story of him going from child to child in a ward, where all of them were expected to die soon, and injecting them with the insulin he’d made. Dozens of comatose children on their death beds woke up that day instead of fading away. What she was doing was right there with that heroic discovery in Kay’s mind, and all he could see in her eyes was an almost desperate need to help people that were suffering.

“Alright. Walk me through your plans. I want all of them, step by step, but… Yes, you have my permission and my cooperation in continuing.”

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Zeia pushed back from her chair and bowed deeply to him, the first time she’d ever shown that level of outward demonstration of respect. “Thank you.”

“Did you think I’d say no at this point?”

She looked like some kind of looming giant filled with purpose as she rose back up, for all the foot or so shorter she was than Kay. “No, I can tell you care about helping people, too. It’s very gratifying to be proved right, though.”

Hours later Kay watched as three people locked against restraints meant to hold them in place vacillate between bouts of rage, paranoia, and delusion and lucidity. When they were lucid they were cordial and cooperative, if also stressed out and afraid. When they were raving… Well, they were textbook examples of people descending into becoming a vampyr. All three were locked down so that they couldn’t lash out or try to escape when they weren’t lucid, with tough metal rods connecting the manacles locked around their ankles and wrists.

Two of them were human women, guards from one of the villages along Nelam’s border that had been flattened by the horde of vampyr that had spread from the doomed nation. The third was a beastkin man with slitted eyes, rough scales all along his limbs, and a set of incredibly sharp teeth in a strong jaw. He had been a slave that had escaped during the ongoing multi-way war that had erupted after the now deceased King Glowl has been defeated by Kay during the Shatterplate War and he’d become one of the protectors of his band of escapees as they too had fled the vampyr.

Kay waited off to the side as Zeia managed her assistants, the medical professionals and healers that had been selected to attend, and the guards on hand in case things went sideways. Technically Zeia had no official assistants, but members of her squad from the Shatterplate Order has experience helping her in other attempts to save people from the vampyr taint and had volunteered to help. Together with Kay being there, the odds of the experiment ending that badly were low. The worst outcome Kay could imagine actually happening was the three volunteers dying.

“Alright everyone!” Zeia called out once things were prepared. “I’m going to go everything one more time before we begin! Our three volunteers will be going to become vampires so that they don’t become vampyr. Seeing as this is out first test of doing this via vampire venom instead of his majesty’s Skills, we will be doing this as closely to our limited sources as we can. His majesty is going to bite our volunteers and inject a large amount of his venom into them, which should begin the process of turning them.” She glanced over at Kay, “I know that this is going to be a first for you and we’re not going to be able to get it perfectly line up but please try and give them all the same amount, your majesty.”

Kay nodded his acceptance.

“Our healers, doctors, and medics are on standby in case something goes wrong and our volunteers can be healed. Our combatants are on standby in case things go the worst possible way.”

“And I will be on standby after I finish my initial duty in case the turning does not look like it will be successful.” Kay looked directly at the three volunteers and hoped they were able to understand him. “Should it look like the venom isn’t enough, I will be using my Skills to ensure our volunteers come out the other side either way.”

Zeia bowed her head for a moment before she looked up and panned her gaze across the room. “Does anyone have any questions or concerns before we begin? This is the one and only chance to say something.”

No one spoke up.

“Very well, your majesty, if you will.”

Kay stepped forward and grabbed the first woman’s neck. The potentially intimate action was completely robbed of that kind of feeling thanks to the dozen or so people watching and the context of what was happening, which somehow helped. Guided by instincts that had come with his transformation and that were very hard to explain, Kay sunk his fangs into the woman’s neck. Those same instincts told him when he’d injected “the right amount” of venom, however much that happened to be, and he gave it two more seconds just to be sure. After that he stepped to the other woman, then the man.

A handful of minutes passed as everyone observed the three volunteers. During their moments of lucidity they began to look uncomfortable, then one of them began groaning in pain. Soon the room was filled with the sounds of agony and the volunteers were no longer struggling against their restrains because they were being driven by madness, but because what was happening to them hurt so badly. Some of the healers rushed closer and began laying spells and Skills on them, which seemed to dull the pain but didn’t remove it. Still, Kay knew that less pain was infinitely better than feeling all of it in that situation.

At times it looked like something was shifting beneath the skin of the three of them, like something was burrowing through their bodies but the longer it went on the less that happened. Small, subtle changes in their bodies, almost unnoticeable marks of eldritch corruption, were eaten away and erased, returning their bodies closer to their original state. The moments where madness and rage were visible behind their eyes in addition to the pain decreased, until there was only sanity visible next to the agony. Kay could feel the need to destroy and eradicate everything eldritch fade away, bit by bit.

After almost and hour, the beastkin man slowly stopped screaming, his cries become quieter whimpers and moans that petered out themselves soon after. He sagged against his his restraints before slowly lifting his head up. He opened his mouth to speak, then stopped as he glanced off to the side, obviously reading a System notification.

“Miss Zeia, I…” His voice was harsh from all the screaming and his eyes started welling with fresh tears. He tried to clear his throat before continuing. “I do believe it worked.”