The Fallen Vampire

"Taira, have you ever wondered what your grandfather was like?"

"On a few short occasions I suppose." Taira slowly helped Inadu down from the windowsill without giving much thought to Adam's question.

"Wonderful... BECAUSE YOU'RE GOING TO FUCKING MEET HIM!!"

Ayame made a slashing motion in the air with her claws and a wave of power shot out with the goal of turning her handsome intruder into chicken fingers.

But of course, Taira was able to flip out of harms way with Inadu in his clutches and completely avoid such a dangerous fate.

"Why are you so angry? I thought you liked me."

"W-W-Who likes you?! I am twice your damn age, you punk!"

"What does that have to do with me being your son-in-law?"

"..Oh, you meant... I... FUCK YOU!"

"...?"

Inadu seemed to be the only one who had an inkling of what was going on as she flipped across the room in Taira's grasp.

The vampire hybrid finally landed on a couch on the other side of the room and finally released his companion from the princess carry he had her in.

"I'm sorry about that... I thought that she would be in a better mood when we arrived."

"Taira... have you noticed any reason why the queen might be feeling upset?"

Taira's red eyes glanced over at Ayame, and he fully took in the sight of her gnashed teeth and fully exposed upper body uncovered by an ounce fabric.

"Ah... Seems we've woken you. You have our apologies."

"....Is that all that you have taken from seeing me here like this?" Ayame asked with a blank stare.

"Is there more? You can't be sick."

Ayame's face twitched several times before she let out a depressed noise and sank back into bed.

'I knew it... I have gotten fat. I need to get out and train more.'

Inadu stared at Taira with a bit of an incredulous expression.

Over the course of their day together she had seen him be kind, attentive, vigilant, unknowingly charming and even somewhat funny.

Only now was she realizing that he could also be somewhat dense and had very little concept of others' privacy.

'Now that I think about it, I believe Lucia told me a similar story that took place before they were even married. This kind of thing really does seem to be par for the course with him... what an odd man he is.'

But despite the inner dialogue in her head, Inadu was forced to admit to herself that she did not dislike these qualities about Taira in the slightest.

She even found them to be rather endearing.

"Why the hell are you here and why did you suddenly bring the spider demon girl along with you…?" Ayame asked from underneath her covers.

"I came here to get your help organizing a small field trip. And she is my companion for the day."

"You group of shut ins want to go on a field trip..? We're still waiting to see the full fallout from that stunt that you pulled with the heroes, so what could possibly make you want to go running around in the meantime?"

"The opening of the secret realm… and we are not shut ins."

For some reason, spending 50 years underground in a cavern compound did not strike Taira as something that would make he and his wives be considered shut-ins.

After hearing what this field trip would be about, Ayame immediately sat up on the bed and stared daggers into Taira.

"What are you talking about..? How could you possibly know when and where the secret realm is going to open up?"

"Our mutual burden informed me."

It took a moment's thought before Ayame realized that they were talking about Fenris.

She had a flurry of questions that she wanted to ask, but there was one that stood out more than others.

"Why are you sharing such valuable information with me?"

"Are you not one of the heads of the fallen? The more opportunities you get to empower yourself, the greater our strength as a whole. It would help if you could contact Aja as well."

"Not Ja'Zaki and Kyoen?"

Taira held out his hand and Yasuke appeared within his palm in it's seven foot form.

He casually stabbed the butt end of the spear into the shadows at his feet, and they let out a yell .

"Oww! You bastard!"

Ja'Zaki crawled out of the shadows like a demon from hell, wearing a fresh wound in his shoulder and a horribly pitiful expression.

"You brute! You could have just said that you knew I was here!"

"You could have not used me to hide. That was impolite."

Inadu : 'Why do you only notice something is amiss when others do it..?'

Ayame finally covered herself with her bedsheets as she gnashed her menacing teeth together.

Dark claws sprouted from her fingertips and she crawled out of her bed with a staggeringly oppressive aura surrounding her.

"You assassins and your damn lack of boundaries... I'LL KILL YOU BOTH!!!"

-

Ayame failed to kill them both.

Twenty minutes later, her room was a complete and total mess because Ja'Zaki and Taira leapt across the four walls inside like a pair of jack rabbits to avoid any of her attacks.

When she finally grew exhausted from trying to assault them, she huffed and puffed as she glared hatefully at the two men sitting side by side on her shredded bed.

"You damn rodents...!"

"I resent that term."

"As do I."

"I don't care what you resent! Start coming through front doors like normal people!"

""...Fine.""

The two assassins relented, but it didn't seem like a compromise that they were relatively happy to make.

Taira looked towards the corner of the room where Inadu was still standing around untouched, looking as if she were concerned about his overall well-being.

"Come here, Ina." he asked gently.

When she sat next to him, both Ayame and Ja'Zaki stared at the pair with slightly suspicious gazes.

""Are the two of you together?""

""As in proximity?""

"..."

"..."

"Nevermind."

"Dense bastards..."

Ayame moved over to her destroyed wardrobe and pulled out two paper scrolls with glowing blue runes.

"I understand you aren't a fan of him, but Kyoen should also know about this. He also has people to protect."

Taira glanced at Inadu out of the corner of his eye.

He was largely unsure of how she felt about her brother, so he decided not to say anything too upsetting in her presence at risk of insulting her.

"...Alright."

Ayame let out a low chuckle as she unfurled the papers and started writing.

Taira gave her all of the details about date, time, and exact location along with a recommendation to bring around thirty of their absolute best forces.

The secret realm was too dangerous to just bring any wanton individual inside, so only those who could both capitalize on the experience and keep themselves safe needed to go inside.

"Is there anything else you want to mention to us?" Ayame asked as she finished writing the letters.

Taira thought about it for a couple of moments before realizing that he had indeed neglected to mention something important.

"Oh, right. The heroes already have this information and we will very likely have to clash against them to get inside."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"WHAT!?"